Up With a Twist
by ricochette
Summary: One shot of vodka, preferably top shelf. Nearly a shot of peach schnapps. Add cranberry and grapefruit juices. Garnish with a cherry. Serve in a high ball glass. OC/Winters. COMPLETE WITH EPILOGUE.
1. I

**Author's Note: **I wasn't going to post this, but I just and posted it. Wild, I know. Very wild indeed. Drop me a review and let me know what you think about it.

**I.**

Take your practiced powers and stretch them out  
until they span the chasm between two  
contradictions...For the god  
wants to know himself in you.

_Rilke_

**May, 1942; The Rising Sun, New York City.**

She put down the rocks glass which conveniently stored her courage. The smell of cigarettes permeated through the foggy air, already tainted by the same vice. It was a smell that would have bothered her two years ago – in fact, it did. It had always bothered her. Faye remembered a time when things were different. _The way I was. The way I _should_ have been. The way it isn't anymore_.

She wasn't from New York and she didn't quite fit in. Her accent was marked by her Midwestern upbringing and her skin was used to tanning when she would walk down her family's long, winding dirt driveway to collect the mail. She was a type of curiosity and was much more of a novelty when she had arrived two years prior. Faye recalled her first walk into the Rising Sun… and how everyone's eyes turned to her. "Hmm, what's that girl doin' here? She ain't from here," said one of the regulars (who she now knew as Bill) as she shyly walked into what would become her new place of employment. It wasn't common for a young lady to tend bar. It was highly out of the ordinary. She was motivated by her need – her cold, desperate need – which she realized when she stepped off her train that arrived in Pennsylvania Station the morning before. She had nothing but two suitcases and a purse, cautiously strapped across her chest, hanging off of her hip.

The lights and life of New York City had enticed her to make the long, arduous trip from Kansas. Her inheritance wasn't much. Her father had died in a farm-related accident when she was eleven years old. Her mother, Marlene, wasn't quite the same after that. Her brother, Robert, enlisted in the Army on his eighteenth birthday – August 31, 1939. Marlene knew the Murdoch family farm wasn't large enough to contain Robert, so she held her head high when she heard the news. Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. On September 3, Britain has committed itself to war, and other nations followed. _What a goddamned time to join the service, _Faye mused, as she looked at her golden brown whiskey.

**1938. Murdoch Family Farm, Kansas.**

Marlene threw away conventions when her husband died. He was somewhat of a teetotaler and there was no liquor in the house. The liquor cabinet at that time was home to a pistol and a Bible. "A place for everything, and everything in its place," he used to say. Nobody quite figured out what that meant, but they all knew he wasn't a God-fearing man. After he died, they never said his name. Marlene never spoke about him to the children – he was "him". It was a taboo topic, and Marlene was motivated every morning, while applying her cherry red lipstick, by the prospect of moving on. And, as for the liquor cabinet… she became a collector. Everything was organized by spirit, and each bottle of each spirit was organized alphabetically. And the collection soon outgrew the cabinet, and part it moved into the kitchen countertop. And Bible and the pistol resumed their places in Marlene's bedroom, on her vanity stand, right by her perfume and lipstick. She was a woman of fortitude.

Now, she wasn't an alcoholic, as could easily have been assumed by her vast liquor collection. Visitors to the Murdoch house sat in the parlor in awe, as they peered into the kitchen. If booze were books – Marlene Murdoch had a full on Library of Congress. Organized alphabetically to boot! She drank whiskey every evening, as she sat on her porch and watched the sunset over her land. When Faye inquired as to why her ma's booze collection was so big, Marlene cocked her daughter a well-rouged and coy smile.

"I don't quite know how things got to the point they have. I just like having something that others wouldn't quite expect, you know? You'd come into the house and think there's a man living here. It's not that way anymore. Maybe it's cause I want to feel like there's a man around. Maybe not. Maybe cause I like mixing things? I don't know, baby. Don't know." And with that, Marlene rose up from her chair and walked inside, leaving Faye alone on the porch. The subject was no brought up again and the bottles in the kitchen and in the cabinet remained untouched, except for the bottle of whiskey that was always prominently placed on the counter, near the garlic, knives, and cutting board.

And one day after dinner, Marlene pulled out a glass and an old whiskey bottle with strange-looking top on it that Faye perceived was designed to pour liquid smoothly and efficiently. "Baby, you've been to school before. Pour me an ounce and a half." Faye stared at her mother in disbelief, and then shifted her eyes to the old bottle with the new top, which her mother had filled with warm water. "Pour me an ounce and a half." Marlene wasn't kidding, and the two sat at the dinner table until Faye had scientifically produced one and a half ounces without thought.

And that was how Faye learned how to pour a shot of liquor into a high ball glass.

**May 1941.**

"You ain't from here." Jim was older, possibly fifty years old, possibly not. Faye was unable to deduce the source of his graying hair – either it was age, stress, or a combination of the two.

"No sir, I'm not," Faye looked up at him with unreadable green eyes. "I'm from Kansas."

"No shit! Errr, excuse the language…." He looked at her apologetically.

"I'd say it comes with the environment. Don't bother with apologies… sir…"

"So, what brings you into the Rising Sun? You're of drinking age, no doubt, but I can tell you ain't here as a customer." Jim stood behind his bar, with a newspaper and a gin and tonic in front of him. The headline read "LONDON IN RUBBLE" and the cover had a picture of the bombed out remains of a home, with furniture and clothing strewn out haplessly in front of it.

"I would like a job, sir." Faye looked at him with wide eyes, as this was what she had been waiting for.

"Excuse me?"

"To tend bar. To make drinks. To work here." Faye looked at him inquisitively. She had worn a black pair of trousers, functional flat leather shoes, and a white dress shirt that she had purchased at a rest stop in Pennsylvania. Her bags were at her cousin Angie's apartment, which was in Brooklyn. Angie was Marlene's sister's daughter, and Angie's letters of encouragement had pulled Faye out of Kansas and put her onto a train to the Big Apple.

"Are you joking with me, Miss…"

"Murdoch. Faye Murdoch. No, sir, I'm serious. I just got off of the train yesterday and I am living on a couch in Brooklyn. This is what I know how to do. Learned from my mother. I'm a good pour. I need a job. I don't have much, and I can make you money. I can pull a crowd in here and I'm fast. I won't waste your time. Give me a chance, sir. If after one go, I'm not to your liking, be done with me, and I'll make my leave. Just one chance, sir. I can do it." She sounded desperate at this point, but it was all she had. She had tried other bars in the area, but they all said different things to the same effect. She was too young and she was female. These things were not said outright, of course, but they were implied and she took the hint as every bar owner turned her away.

Jim looked over Faye. He cursed that son of a bitch, Max – his bartender who had just quit to enlist in the service. _God damned Max, you leave me and what a hell of a situation I'm in, _Jim thought, as he looked at his watch, and noticed that Happy Hour was soon to start. It was a busy shift, and Max quit out of the blue, after he got news of his brother's death in North Africa. He understood Max's desire to be a part of something bigger than himself. Yet, with the impending Happy Hour shift and no bartender, Jim was thrown into something bigger than himself as well – potential hordes of customers in suits and dresses, maybe even likely to spend a big buck to start Friday night early. _You piece of shit, Max, you piece of shit_. Jim cared for Max, and treated him like a son almost, but his anxiety was getting the best of him. _Is this some joke? Who the hell is coming in next, General Fucking Patton? Jesus Christ. I can't believe I'm about to do this. How the hell is this gonna go down? Christ. What I'm about t do…_

And it was with those thoughts in mind that Jim Bellows, a nervous bar owner who hadn't poured drinks in God knows how long, made a decision.

"Damn it, you're hired. Happy Hour starts in forty minutes. You're on in thirty. Wear what you've got on. If you need a smoke, now's the time to do it."

**May, 1942, The Rising Sun, New York City.**

Faye was lost in her glass of whiskey. It was slightly past last call, and she was smoking a Lucky Strike slowly, as if to make it last as long as possible. She had been going over her past and how she came to work at the Rising Sun. She thought about how Jim could have possibly considered her for a job after she came into his bar looking like hell, desperate like no other, begging for work. He was a good man, yet misunderstood. She thought of her mother in Kansas, who let her break free shortly after she turned eighteen, because, in Marlene Murdoch's words, "You're bigger than Kansas, just like Robert. Baby, you're a lot bigger."

She grew up in Kansas, but the Rising Sun had made her an adult. The Faye of Kansas was not quite shy, but not quite outgoing. New York City and the Rising Sun forced her to fend for herself and to stand tall. It was from Kansas that she learned how to work and acquired a trade. It was in New York City that she learned about the world.


	2. II

**Author's Note:** To those of you reading "Here, Where the World is Quiet", the bar and bartender will look familiar. The Rising Sun is Anya's favorite bar of all time. If you haven't read my fic, "Here, Where the World is Quiet", then you might want to consider reading the _**first and second chapters**_to understand why Anya Metternich is on the train with Nixon and Winters.

Other note: She won't be a major character in this at all. She's just helping things along. And who knows… she may show up with Ron for a drink at some point much later on.

Please enjoy responsibly.

**II.**

Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window - no, I don't feel how small I am - but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body.

_Ayn Rand ("The Fountainhead")_

**August 31, 1943. Brooklyn.**

She sat with a cigarette on the fire escape, looking east. Faye felt like New York City was a living being, its heart at Grand Central Terminal, which she felt was one of the greatest modern architectural achievements. The subway and the buses -- the veins transporting the blood -- the people -- throughout the city's ever-expanding limbs. An old coffee cup which had been cracked through and through acted as her ashtray whilst she sat on the hard metal bars and dangled her feet over the escape.

"You hated cigarettes when you came here," she could hear Angie say loudly from the kitchen.

"And you used to hate living in Brooklyn." Faye replied quickly. She held a black coffee in her other hand, nursing as she watched Manhattan in the east, in all of its early morning grandeur. The people she made drinks for could have their high rises on the East Side, right along Central Park. The view in Brooklyn was better, for you could see the city in full, from skyscraper to skyscraper. She had been told about the skyscrapers in school as a child. _New York City? Those heathens have built a new Babylon, hoping to reach God. Your ambition can't outstretch your ability, now, can it?_ Her grandmother's words echoed in her head. She never quite liked her mother's mother. Faye's mother, Marlene, often referred to her as _That Old Fool, _interchanging various four and five letter words to describe her depending on her mood. Marlene's mother never approved of her life choices.

"You think work will be busy today?" Angie asked, looking at the rent money that sat on the kitchen table.

"Are we short?" Faye asked, getting to the point.

"Ask me that again in four days when they shut the electricity off." They were short. They could afford the rent but the utilities were another story.

"It's not _that_ bad," Faye said loudly through the window to the fire escape. She thought of that one time when the heat was shut off in March. That had been bad. "It's August. I'll take a cold shower or read by candlelight. I'm beyond caring." This was true.

New York City, for being a living being, was a witch. Sighing, Faye finished her cigarette and put it in the old coffee cup that she kept on the fire escape. Climbing back into the apartment, she took her coffee with her and soundly finished it in the small kitchen.

"I met a man the other day." Angie said, as if randomly.

"Yeah?" Faye asked, not desiring to know the full extent of how well Angie knew this man.

"A soldier."

"That sounds like bad news to me." Faye reasoned with her. Angie was three years older than Faye. Faye thought, perhaps, that Angie might have known better. "In the Pacific?"

"No. He's being deployed tomorrow." Angie took a bite of her toast as she continued talking. "I reckon to Europe, too."

"And you think it will somehow last? Whatever he feels for you?" Faye asked almost smiling. "You're smarter than that." Angie would not back down, however.

"He's coming here tonight. Troop ship's at the pier."

"So you're going to help a man go AWOL?" Faye joked. "That sounds a bit excessive. There are plenty of guys in --"

"In Brooklyn? All the good young ones are off to war."

"Then wait 'til _after _the war."

"You're no fun, you know that?" Angie said, caring little if Faye actually disapproved. The two got along well -- they were all each other had. Faye was reluctant to see Angie get torn up over a man who would most likely forget about her when he left the next day.

"And now I need to get my boring ass to the Rising Sun or else Jim Bellows will have my head."

"You know, that Jim Bellows would never fire you." Angie reasoned as Faye put her wallet in her larger purse and began to walk out of the third story apartment.

"And that's why on time is always late... And early is always on time. If there's a delay with that 7 train again, my morning's going to turn sour real quick."

"Yeah, gotta love Brooklyn."

"I don't love Brooklyn, Angie. Brooklyn, unfortunately, seems to love us, though..." She joked.

"Make some money then! See you after last call."

"As always..." Faye said as she walked out and closed the door behind her. She ran down the steps of the apartment building and her feet hit the pavement of the street. The day had already begun for so many New Yorkers. Faye's job didn't require her to be there until noon. Angie made her money watching the children that lived in the apartment building whilst their parents were at work. Two babies had been in cribs in Angie's room when Faye had left that morning. Three more kids were to be dropped off within the hour.

Faye ran down the stairs to the subway and placed her token in the slot at the turnstile. She saw Orson, who always took the train at the very same time as her in the morning. There were a few men and women that she always saw -- regulars -- always taking the 7 at the same time, going toward Manhattan.

"Damned train is going to be late again," Orson moaned, pointing to the paper that he had folded in his hand. "Stupid repairs, something about the heat affecting the rails or some other slop."

"It's going to be a lovely morning, Orson. I can feel it." Faye answered sarcastically as she looked down the train tracks, hoping to see the light from a train approaching in the distance. The tracks were black -- the train was far away, making its way through Queens. It was to be a long morning.

**.x.x.x.x.**

"I'm so sick of that bastard, Dick." Lewis Nixon said as he looked at the other end of the train car. "I've had it up to here." Lewis Nixon looked like a man on the verge of exploding into pieces.

"You were sick of him two years ago." Dick said, craning his head to look at Herbert Sobel at the other end of the train. Sobel was eating a banana looking smug. Dick eyed Lew with amusement and continued, "At least you're consistent."

Anya Metternich walked out of Colonel Sink's car and sat back down next to Nixon.

"We have six hours in between this train ride and getting on that ship." Nixon said with stress evident in his eyes. "Six hours. That's…"

"A long amount of time to be sitting on the same train car with Sobel." Anya said knowingly with a smirk. "And that is precisely why you'll be happy you have such a _charming_ friend in Sink's good graces." Anya paused for a moment and smiled widely. "That's me, by the way." Nixon nodded for her to continue. Dick looked amused.

"This better be worth putting up with a certain Lieutenant Speirs' glares at Toccoa for being your friend." Nixon said this in a cutting tone. Anya realized at that moment that something terrible had happened – something that she had never witnessed, yet only heard about in passing.

Lewis Nixon had run out of Vat 69. His canteen and flask were empty. He was dry.

"Well, as I was saying… I have so many things to do in Manhattan, yet so little time to accomplish them… You and your buddy over here are going to run my errands." Nixon looked at her with interest.

"Go on…"

"I have a bottle of fine gin I want you to pick up." She said bluntly. Lewis Nixon's face broke out into a wide smile.

"Go on…"

"This gin is for Colonel Sink. A very nice brand I told him about. He wanted to try some. I told him that I'm too short on time to gather all of my materials at the Independent Research Institute and my apartment in six hours." It was all coming together now. "Which is a lie, because I'm really going sit in a café with a nice cup of nice espresso, followed by a long walk in Central Park." Dick Winters had to hand it to Anya – he knew she was clever, but this one took the cake.

"And you, Mr. Nixon," Anya continued. "Will be running an errand for me. My good friend and favorite bartender, Jim Bellows, has a private order that I've already paid for – that god damned gin for Sink. You have six hours and he's got a damn fine supply of whiskey, if you catch my drift."

"Have I ever told you you're an angel?" Nixon interjected.

"Something to that effect." Anya said smiling. "And, because I don't trust you in a bar after being on a military base for two years – Dick is going with you."

"Anya…" Dick started, unsure of where this was all going.

"Dick, if _he_ doesn't get on that troop ship, Sink will have my head and then we'll all be screwed." She pleaded with him. "You don't want to be sitting next to _this_ type of Lewis Nixon when we disembark on that long ride at sea, do you?" Dick understood and complied.

"And besides," Anya continued. "I don't know if he'll make it out in one piece, quite frankly. It's a necessary evil at this point, and we're basically giving him a big feast after a famine. Not the smartest idea." Dick chuckled to himself. "But then again, it has to be done. For my sake, at least. I won't listen to his for a week straight. I won't."

"You're lucky I'm an understanding man." Dick said with laughter in his voice.

"Besides, you don't even have to sit in the damn bar the whole time. Take a walk in Central Park. Get a Greek coffee. See the city. Do _something_ while you're here. It'll be a good send off." Anya looked at Lew and then shifted her gaze back to Dick. "And, please, I implore you, make sure that man gets back here in six hours."

The train rolled up into Pennsylvania Station. Anya took a slip of paper out of her book bag and retrieved a pen. She wrote on the paper and then handed it to Dick.

Dick looked down and saw Anya's neat script.

_The Rising Sun_

_West 65__th__ Street_

_(Gin – Jim Bellows)_

"See you later, boys." Anya grabbed her bag and walked off the train.


	3. III

Author's Note: Basically, Dick, for all intents and purposes of this story, looks like the real Dick Winters at that age. Not, Damien Lewis. He isn't a red head, etc. This may be a source of confusion for some readers if I don't state this before I go into any physical descriptions of him.

**III.****  
**If we were all judged according to the consequences

Of all our words and deeds, beyond the intention

And beyond our limited understanding

Of ourselves and others, we should all be condemned.

_T.S. Eliot_

Two men in formal military uniforms walked in. Faye looked at the old clock that stood above the door. It was two p.m., which was an odd time for customers to come in. The bar was dead. Jim Bellows sat on a stool at the bar, like a customer, hovering over his crossword puzzle and sipping on his tonic water.

"I'm looking for a Mr. Jim Bellows." Faye saw that the darker haired man had spoken. She had never seen the men before – and if they were regulars or acquaintances of Jim, she would have seen them in the bar by now.

Jim turned around and his weary face met the two strangers. He looked their boots. Their trousers were bloused. _Paratroopers_, he thought.

"Who's asking?" Jim said, looking at the two men. He had half a mind to tell them that the Rising Sun accepted no solicitors, had it not been for their donations. Truth be told, if they had been in civilian clothes, he would have said, 'We don't donate to churches.' Jim would later find out that Lewis Nixon wasn't pious to very few things.

"Lewis Nixon." Lew said this evenly, not intimidated by the man that sat at the bar. "A friend of Anya Metternich's." He added this and Jim's face broke out into a smile.

"Oh, Anya! How is she doing?" He asked. It was evident that Anya was one of his customers that he actually liked. "I'll bet she's really busy, sending you lot out on an errand."

"Well, you could say that." Lewis said wryly. "I'm here to pick up that bottle of gin for Anya… and to sample what I have been told is a fine selection of whiskeys…"

"Well that Anya certainly has a way with words. Pull up a stool. And your friend too."

"He doesn't drink." Lewis didn't know why he said this, because after he said this he felt like he had betrayed some sort of secret that he should not have divulged. Dick looked at him and felt foolish.

"There's no such thing," a female voice said. Lewis and Dick looked throughout the bar, wondering where the noise had come from. Faye took great pleasure in this and chuckled to herself. "Behind the bar."

"I hadn't thought…"

"You hadn't thought to look there, did you?" She joked. At this moment, Lew looked at her outfit and felt a sense of embarrassment wash over him. She was the bartender.

"Well, there's a first time for everything." Nixon joked, attempting some light humor.

"And so there is. I have two stools." She said this nonchalantly, looking at the bar in front of her. "You're welcome to sit. And so is your friend who apparently doesn't drink." She said this with a smile, but she wasn't mocking him.

"Vat 69 straight up please…" Lew said politely, not wanting to further embarrass himself.

"And for your friend?" Faye said, turning to the handsome man who sat next to him.

"I don't drink." Dick replied. Had he looked weaker, maybe Faye would have laughed. But he didn't. He was easily larger than the dark haired man who sat next to him, and from looking at his uniform, he was more built as well. His face looked like the face of a man who had once been a farm boy in his youth. Maybe his youth wasn't in the far distant past – but it didn't matter, for he was a man now.

"Every man drinks," Faye said. "You just don't know it yet." And she knew, right then and there, when she poured Lewis Nixon's whiskey, that she had, perhaps, met a man who could not be moved.

Faye poured Dick a club soda and placed it in front of him. He looked at her with a slightly curved smile.

"What are your names, then?" Faye asked, breaking the silence. It looked like the two men before her didn't quite want to talk to each other.

"Lewis Nixon… and this, over here, is Dick Winters."

"I see. And where do you come from?"

"Nixon, New Jersey." Faye shot Lewis a funny look when she heard this. Dick saw this and chuckled.

"Lancaster County, in Pennsylvania," Dick stated.

"A humbler place, I'm assuming," Faye said with a laugh.

"You could say that."

"I'm inclined to agree. I've been through those parts before."

"What for?" Nixon asked, with a sense of curiosity.

"When I moved here from Oklahoma."

"Oklahoma… wow. What brought you out to New York City?"

"Lewis Nixon, it was Oklahoma." She said and then she paused. "There wasn't much left after the Dust Bowl. There was nothing left for me there."

"And how did you find yourself working in_ this_ fine establishment?" Lewis asked, continuing to pry. Dick shot him a look, perhaps hoping he would back off.

"He's no bother," Faye said, looking at Dick. "My name's Faye Murdoch, by the way… My mother taught me how to tend bar after my brother enlisted in the Army in 1939. Some say she was crazy – many in fact… and she probably was. But it doesn't matter now, I suppose. No shame in honest work." Dick agreed. There was no shame in honest work.

The three talked with Faye, joking. Dick went through about three club sodas before he had to pull Nixon, almost stuttering, off of a bar stool. He pulled some money out of Lew's jacket pocket and placed it on the table.

"Please… keep the change." He said. Faye struck him as out of place, with her cherry red lips and her feminine appearance. She had long hair tied into a messy bun. Her faced looked innocent, yet her innocence was tainted with the bar, the liquor, and the steady turnover of customers good and bad alike. She was pretty, but she had long since forgotten it. Prettiness did not get her much in this industry, only a few looks of contempt and disbelief. She needed the money, so she kept it up, but she had longed for a job that would be considered more decent. _Stick to what you know, at least for now._ Angie's words rang in her ears. _Stick to what you know until things get better and you can afford to move on_. Faye wondered if that day would ever come. As these thoughts ran through her head, she pulled the twenty dollar bill off of the bar, looking at Dick with a sense of shock. That was a _lot_ of money. Faye had barely been running a tab – maybe it was because she pitied Lewis Nixon, or perhaps because she found his friend Dick enigmatic and therefore attractive.

Making sure he had the bottle of gin safely in a paper bag, Dick prepared to leave the bar. Jim Bellows and long since retreated with his tonic water and newspaper into the back office. Faye stepped out from behind the bar and walked up to Dick and Lewis.

"You two be safe." She said softly, breaking form for a moment. "It would do you well." She looked at Dick as she said those things. She wondered why he looked so natural in uniform. She wondered why his face looked like a work of art. She pondered what made him so muscular compared to his friend. And then, above all, she wondered why he didn't drink.

People stick with us, for an odd variety of reasons. Sometimes, they illuminate within us a sense of the sublime, which may never be matched by another person. We ignore the black space containing what we do not know about them and we focus on only what we do know, and we commit our knowledge to memory. We internalize every conversation, large or small, that we had with that person, and we hide it within our memory. And those memories, though we may not know it, constitute what may be considered the best within us – the people we have met, the strangers we have encountered. We are like ships passing in the night, grasping onto nothing but the faint horizon that lights up the black sea. And we wait, for no reason other than a strange sense of hope and longing, for that person to return. For no other reason than to satisfy ourselves – and to prove that person really does exist, in all of their perfection. We hold out daily, wanting nothing else, because nobody else can climb up and sit on that pedestal. We have ruined ourselves, but we are glad of it, for it makes us better. And these are the gods we worship, the people we venerate, the sculptures we have stored in our own museums. They stand naked, chiseled, in all of their human glory – staring at the sky and challenging the sun. They are the best of us. And perhaps, we too, are the best of them. But we will never know such things lest we go out and challenge the sun ourselves.

"As you. Don't forget about yourself." Dick replied to her, unsure of what to truly say. He smiled slightly and he held Lewis' Nixon's hand and dragged him out of the bar.

She watched them leave and she wondered why they seemed so unique, yet so familiar. Oh well, she thought. They were lost to history now.

She sat behind the bar, sipping on unsweetened iced tea and looking over her crossword puzzle with a pen ready. _Six down. Eight letter word for –_

The door opened abruptly and Angie stormed in, pulling Faye away from her crossword puzzle. Faye rose to greet her.

"Faye! I came here to tell you…" She started. "Well, there's no easy way to say this but…"

"You're pregnant."

"Faye! What type of woman do you take me for?" Angie said surprised.

"I'm trying to cover all the bases, you know, of what I think would be difficult and upsetting news," she said, almost joking. "But seriously, Angie, out with it."

"I'm going to Europe." Angie said. Faye dropped her pen on the bar and its noise resounded as it hit the oak bar top.

"You're lying." Faye countered.

"No, Faye…"

"Please tell me you're lying."

"I told the landlady about forty minutes ago."

"I'm going to strangle you."

"Faye, be reasonable."

"BE REASONABLE?! Where the hell am I going to go with you gallivanting off across the European continent during a war? How the hell am I going to afford rent?"

"You could, you know… come with me." Angie reasoned.

"You're insane."

"There's nothing left for you here. What, the bar will keep you? It's just a god damned bar, Faye. You can find a bar anywhere."

"What happened to being _respectable_, Angie? Hmm? What happened to that? How about _not_ throwing responsibility out the window? How about that?"

"Well, you don't really have a choice at this point, Faye…"

"Excuse me?" She said, pouring herself a strong drink.

"I used the rent money." Faye sat down and took a swig from her drink. Afterwards, she lit a cigarette and began to smoke in disbelief.

"And what, pray tell, did you use the rent money on?"

"Two tickets to England."

"This isn't happening." Faye said. "This is what's going to happen – I'm going to wake up in my shitty apartment in Brooklyn, I'm going to have my cigarette and coffee on the fire escape, and then I'm going to come back to work, tomorrow…"

"This is real." Angie said as she pulled two tickets out of her purse and placed them on the bar top. "Ship sails tomorrow morning."

"Get out of my bar." Faye said with a strong tone of voice. "I'll see you back at the apartment."

Angie defiantly took the tickets back and walked out of the bar.

Faye rose from her seat and looked back at the office.

"Jim!" She shouted. "We need to talk!"


	4. IV

Author's Note: I'm glad people are enjoying this story, because it's fun to write. Please leave a review, though!

**IV.**

Doubt is a pain  
too lonely to know  
that faith is his twin brother.

_Gibran_

"I can't accept this, Jim," Faye said after he slid her an envelope which she opened. It contained one hundred dollars.

"When you started out here I put you in a bind because I thought you would fail. You came through when Max left me to fight a bunch of Nazis. Now I'm going to come through for you." He said this with sincerity. "And don't you dare try to give me that money back."

"I'm sorry it's come down to this, Jim. I didn't mean for it."

"I know you well, like you're my family. I know it was Angie." He said ruefully. He didn't want her to go, but he knew that he couldn't hold her at the Rising Sun forever. "Who knows… it might do you well to have a change of scenery."

"Jim, I doubt it will last for long." Faye said, sort of hoping that Angie would come to her senses and that they would find themselves back in New York City in less than a month. They had good relationships with their landlady, their fellow tenants, and their friends here. It wouldn't be difficult for them to resume their lives if things went awry.

"I wish you well, Faye. And if you ever find yourself back in New York, I'd be honored to have you work here again." Jim looked upset. Faye had never see Jim look upset before.

"I don't know why the hell I'm even agreeing to this."

"I know why. That Angie of yours is the only person you have to fall back on. And to put it simply, you're up a creek." Jim was in no condition to ever take her in and they both knew this. "And things happen for a reason, mark my words. It'll be good for the both of ya's. Mark my words."

Anya walked out of the Rising Sun unaware of whether or not she'd ever see it again. She had been hired there on a whim, almost, as a result of a chain of events that had been initiated because of Max's enlistment in the Army.

Angie's surprise left her shaken. She mulled over everything and morosely realized that she had nothing else left in the world. She wouldn't go back to Oklahoma; she made this pact with herself when she left for the first time. While in New York, her only goal was to shake off the remnants of Oklahoma. After she had succeeded in doing this, she found herself without a goal in New York. She saved the little money that she had, but it was never for any future. She didn't imagine a future. As for Angie, she didn't know about her goals either. She didn't know why Angie even wound up in Brooklyn in the first place – did it even matter?

"New York City, you've left me a bastard." Anya said loudly as she walked out of the Rising Sun and her feet pressed onto the warm pavement. It was not a long walk to the subway. The 7 train, much to her surprise, was running on time.

"Figure's they'd get the show on the road when I'm leaving." She muttered.

x.x.x.x.x.

Angie sat on the bed with Sam. He was shirtless and he was staring out the window. The window was open and the horns, sirens, and pedestrians on the street below bled into the space of the room. Angie wanted a change. She found Sam refreshing and incredibly different. He was handsome, established, and unpredictable. He made her feel like she was alive, more than she had ever felt before.

"Baby, write this down. It's where you'll meet me in England when you get there." Angie pulled a paper and pen off of the hotel room's table. "Aldbourne. It's a town near Swindon."

"And how will I find you there?" she asked as she wrote down the name of the town and its neighbor.

"They'll be loads of Americans. You just try to find out where B Company is – B Company, the 101st Airborne. It's a company of Paratroopers. You won't be able to miss it." _Baby, you'll hear us from a mile away._

x.x.x.x.x.

Faye sat on the fire escape with her cup of coffee and a cigarette. The sun was setting over the city. The sun beams danced on the Chrysler Building, which was Faye's favorite. The Indian summer had brought her much happiness, with its warmth and its zephyrs, dancing over her bare skin. There was something strangely pure about it. It reminded her of her favorite parts of Oklahoma, back on her family's well-hidden estate.

She sighed and looked out over Manhattan. She wondered when she would see it next – next month, next year – she had no idea. She had little idea of why she truly wanted to go with Angie, either. The faint sound of the front door shutting caused her to put out her cigarette and take her coffee inside.

"Hi Faye." Angie said this with a sense of sadness. Her eyes were red, as if she had been crying for some time.

"Troop ship left?" Faye inquired.

"I'm terrified." Angie said. Faye looked at her and in that moment understood everything she needed to know.

"Angie?" She asked. Angie's eyes met hers. "I'm sorry about earlier."

"I shouldn't have dragged you into this, Faye. I'm sorry for that. I really am."

"I know you are. But we'll work through it. Maybe it was meant to be." She said, attempting a smile.

"I suppose we should back our bags then?"

"It's alright. I didn't like New York anyways…" Faye muttered.

"You're a terrible liar, you know that?"

"And you're a terrible travel planner."

x.x.x.x.x.x.

_On the troop ship…_

"Anya?" Dick said as he knocked on her cabin door. Anya was fortunate enough to have her own cabin, much like the other higher ranking officers on the troop ship.

"Enter!" she said. She knew that voice. Her eyes met Dick's. He placed a paper bag on the table in her room and looked at her.

"Why did you send me along? Lew's responsible enough." He said. He was a grown man. He could take the truth.

"I knew you wouldn't drink. I wanted you to meet somebody."

"That bartender, Faye."

"That's right."

"Why, Anya?" Faye's cherry red lips lingered in Dick's memory.

"Dick, I honestly don't know. You know when you have gut feelings?" He nodded. "Well, it just seemed right." She said this almost solemnly. "I'm going to go to bed now, but… thanks for the gin. Have a good night, Dick."

x.x.x.x.x.x.

**Aldbourne, England. September.**

"What does a woman have to do around here to get a decent cup of coffee?" Faye said loudly as she sat next to Angie. They had just arrived in Aldbourne and were in search of living quarters and employment. Like good Americans, however, they needed their fuel to continue their quest – coffee. Faye and Angie sat dejectedly at the bar in a pub.

"Go to Italy." The man's voice was familiar. Faye looked up from the bar table and her eyes met a familiar face.

"Lewis Nixon. Fancy seeing you here."

"Faye Murdoch, you are a testament to the small size of the world."

"You're stationed here then?" Faye said somewhat surprised.

"Well, I was actually here on vacation, but then the war broke out…" Nixon started, as he scratched his head in feigned confusion.

"You know this man, Faye?" Angie said with great surprise.

"A customer from New York," Faye said with a tone of voice that old Angie to back off. "How are you doing, Lewis? And… your friend… Dick, was it?" Of course she knew his name was Dick. Of course she did.

"I'm well." He said with a slight sense of amusement that he could not attribute to any one source. "And Dick is fine." He added. Dick was always fine. It was in Dick's nature to be fine – Lewis expected nothing less. In a world of _less than fine_ and _scraping by_ and _barely breathing_, Dick was always fine. "But what _I_ am incredibly eager to now, however, is what brought you and your friend…"

"My cousin."

"You and your _cousin_, out here to England in the middle of a war, when we all know travel was being advised against."

"I'm going to wipe that smirk off your face," Faye said under her breath.

"Pardon?"

"What I said was that _Angie_, over here, is the reason why I'm sitting in this pub in England of all places. I wish the story was more interesting, quite frankly, but we can't always get what we want."

"From Oklahoma to New York City to Aldbourne. Faye Murdoch, you certainly get around."

"You remembered my full name." Faye said with a sense of amazement. Faye had a great memory, which proved beneficial when making a bunch of drinks simultaneously and delivering them into the hands of the right customers. She also never forgot a name.

"Faye Murdoch, you seem to be unaware that you are rather unforgettable." He added, with all seriousness. Angie turned to the door and saw Sam walking in. Her eyes lit up and she ran over to meet him. Faye sighed and lit a cigarette.

"Lewis Nixon, you may as well pull up a stool and sit next to me," Faye said as she let the smoke escape her cherry red lips. "Unless, of course, you have a better woman to sit next to." Lewis was unsure of whether or not she was joking. Her humor was dry and spot on, but he never knew. He felt that no matter what he did or thought, she would always be able to put him in his place. Lewis sat down next to her and ordered a Vat 69.

"You drank that whiskey when I served you." She said plainly. "You seem to be a committed man… to one thing, at least. I reserve the right to make further judgments later." She said this with a smile, causing Lewis to chuckle lightly. Lewis looked in Angie's direction and smirked.

"Your cousin dragged you to England all for some trooper from that lousy B Company." He remarked.

"I told you the story wasn't that interesting." Faye had been telling the truth, to Lewis' surprise. "Angie is quite… motivated… shall we say…"

"Well she landed you in quite a predicament then." Lewis said as he lit a cigarette and lost himself in a scheme that he was devising. "Where are you two staying?"

"We just got here today. When the owner comes around, I'm hoping to get a job around these parts." Faye sighed. "I don't know, Lewis."

"You shouldn't have a problem, actually. I know for a fact that the owner here is short-staffed, especially with the recent influx of Americans. He'd get a lot of money with you behind the bar." Lewis said, acting rather helpful.

Before Faye or Lewis could call Angie over to discuss potential plans, she and her lover, Sam, had left the pub.

"Damn her, you know? Damn her." Faye said as she blew smoke from her Lucky Strike from between her lips.

After about fifteen minutes, Lewis Nixon pointed Faye to the owner who had just walked into the bar.

"On that note, I take my leave. Good luck." Lewis said with a whisper. "And, by the way, his name is Mr. Bartleby." Lewis Nixon walked away confidently and left the pub.

Faye watched Mr. Bartleby get behind the bar and put on his apron. His movements were slow and his hair was a dark shade of grey. He had a fisherman's beard, which instantly reminded Faye of the piers in Brooklyn. When he walked past her, she pushed her empty glass across the table, getting his attention.

"Aye?"

"Mr. Bartleby. I have an offer to extend to you." She said with confidence.

"'Scuse me, miss?" Faye extended her hand and it met his. She shook his hand firmly, expressing that she was serious with her intentions. Mr. Bartleby looked at her cherry red lips and then met her eyes – she was looking deeply into his eyes with a look that was steeped in ambition.

"Allow me to introduce myself." Faye said with a serious face, garnished with a slight smile. Mr. Bartleby was taken aback by her American accent, for a female American accent was rare these days, save for the occasional nurse that would come around the pub. "Faye Murdoch, most recently of New York City. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"Miss Murdoch, I don't take kindly to solicitors." He hated salesmen and women with a passion.

"I assure you Mr. Bartleby, I have an offer that you mustn't refuse." She stated plainly. The man in front of her stared at her intently waiting for her to continue. "A little bird told me that you happen to be understaffed. And judging by the state of this pub right now, I think it's safe to say that you are in a mighty fine predicament. I also happen to know that this town is going to fill to the brim with _more_ American troops soon – and even a few Canadians."

"Go on, miss."

"And we both know what this means for your business. It's going to go through the roof. You're going to have men banging down your doors whenever they can get out of training. And imagine the weekends! You're going to be inundated with these soldiers… and their _American_ dollars. I hear the rate is very favorable these days. Is that true, Mr. Bartleby?"

"Aye, it is." He said in all honesty.

"So, what course of action would I recommend to remedy your plight?" She said in earnest. "Hire me. Put me on for a shift and I'll show you how we mix drinks in New York."

"Ma'am, I appreciate it, but it would be most unorthodox to be hiring a female for such a…"

"A man's job? Aye. Your men are all off to war, sir. You'd best hire me. You put me on for a shift, let us say, tonight." Faye paused, with a slight smirk. "And, just so you know, Americans don't quite fancy _warm_ beer. But I'll sell them warm beer, Mr. Bartleby. I'll sell them any drink you have behind this oak bar-top. I'll sell you dry. And, you know what that means…"

He had to admit that she was charming. With her red lips and the dress she wore. Her accent was a different type of American accent. He knew a man from New York. Faye wasn't born and raised there. He wondered about her and her past, what brought her to this industry. He paused and he realized that she had already ensnared him, as he was paying her that much mind. Faye's eyes met his and gave him a smile.

"And, sir, of course you would not have to keep me on had I not been advantageous for your business. I mean, I'm only here for our mutual interests." Faye lit another cigarette and lightly put out the extra ash on one of the bar top's ash trays. "I've heard rationing has been rather bad, lately. Am I correct?"

"Unfortunately. Control's have been in place for the past three years."

"Oh, I am so very sorry, Mr. Bartleby. I can imagine how dreadful that must be." She said arousing sympathy within him. "Do you have a family, sir?"

"Aye." He had a tired look in his eyes. Faye knew that she would seal the deal with her next line.

"Think of what that extra income – the extra that I'd bring in through here – would do. You'd be able to buy extra food to help feed your family. More meat, bread, and even fresh vegetables. Not to mention I have a few friends in the higher ranks that are stationed here." Faye's mind drifted to Lewis Nixon. She was unaware of his rank but she figured _Why the hell not, Lew wouldn't mind…_ "And some of them even work in the Mess Hall, you know, watching over all of that food. I'm sure if a can or two went missing it wouldn't ruffle any feathers." She said, pretending to be lost in thought. "Aye, that sounds about right, sir." Suddenly her tone of voice became more serious. "Oh, wow, look at me rambling like that! Gee! I wonder where that came from! Sir, I won't waste your time, so I will get back to what I was saying. Do you accept the offer?"

It had been like giving a hot steak dinner to a starving man.

"Miss Murdoch, I've never quite met anybody like you. And, I'm not sure if that's a good thing. But you understand the state of things here. You start working tonight at five pm, you hear?"

"Of course, sir. Of course." Faye rose as she put out her cigarette in the ash tray. "I bid you good day… until tonight." She said, as she smiled at him and left the pub with two large suitcases in hand.

As she walked out of the pub she began to laugh. She had nowhere to go, nothing else to look forward to, and a bit of time to kill.

"FAYE!" She heard Angie shout across the road as she walked out the pub. The soldiers that had been walking instantly took notice of Faye. They had not seen a woman like Faye in a long while, much to their chagrin. A few whistled, while a few tried to get her attention with less obnoxious means. Faye threw a wink at one of the soldiers, causing him to blush. Faye did this for no other reason than the sheer feeling of victory that swam through her veins.

Angie ran up to meet her. She was smiling from ear to ear.

"Good news, I suspect?" Faye said, her blue eyes vibrant against her light skin and dark brown hair.

"Sam's going to marry me!" Angie said as she flaunted a dainty ring that was on her left ring finger. "And…"

"There's more?!" Faye said with a sense of surprise.

"I found a job!"

"Well, that is certainly some news I can take an instant liking to…"

"As a nurse!"

"Angie, you do know what that entails, correct?"

"I know, Faye… but it just seemed right, with the shortage and all. If I get transferred anywhere I'll write to you, you know that…"

"That isn't what I'm worried about." Faye said as she bit her lip.

"Just worry about yourself, okay?" Angie said this politely.

"When's the wedding?" Faye inquired, changing the subject.

"Tonight! You have to come!"

"I have my first day of a job that I had to fight tooth and nail to get, Angie. I'm sorry." Faye didn't want to hurt Angie's feelings. A thought ran across her mind and Faye knelt down to the ground, opening one of her suitcases. She pulled out a small light blue handkerchief. "Here. Something blue." Faye said with a slight smile dancing through her voice, as she closed her suitcase and rose up again to hand it to Angie.

"I knew you wouldn't berate me." Angie said joking.

"You're a grown woman now. I don't have a right." Faye answered. She, of course, had a right to be angry about being dragged across the Atlantic Ocean only to be abandoned by Angie in the possible near future. She didn't want to press the issue. History was in the past, and she had no love affair with the past. It didn't matter now. Dwelling on the remnants of yesterday didn't help. Faye made a silent pact with herself at that very moment that she would not follow a man anywhere, unless she truly wanted to go to that place to begin with.

Angie smiled and pulled Faye into an unexpected hug.

"And!" Angie exclaimed, prepared to give her the rest of the news.

"There's _more?_!" Faye said with a nervous laugh. "Too much of a good thing can be, well…"

"I found us an apartment. Nothing too expensive either, because there are so many open little cottages, you know."

"_That_ is great news. Let's go there now and get rid of these suitcases,the future Mrs…"

"Andrews. The future Mrs. Andrews."

"Angie Andrews, how idyllic!" Faye said sarcastically. "I always knew you'd be the cute one."

"Come on smartass," Angie said. "There's a chill in the air."

The two walked in the direction of their new home – a small cottage not dreadfully far from the hospital or the Queen Vic – Faye's new place of employment. Perhaps things would not be so bad after all.

x.x.x.x.x.

"You'll never guess who I ran into." Lewis said as he took a swig from his flask outside of one of the make shift movie theatres. The sun was beginning to set, causing a feeling of calm to wash over the new base. Dick sat next to Lewis and the two looked at the passing military traffic.

"A good thing or a bad thing?" Dick inquired.

"I'd say good." Lewis said. Of course it was good. He saw the way Dick looked at her back in that bar in New York City. He remembered it like the back of his hand. "And really random."

"Well, go on now, the suspense is killing me…" Dick said, sarcasm evident in his voice.

"The ever so fabulous Faye Murdoch." Lewis Nixon said, almost proud of his discovery. Dick was shocked to be in such close proximity to her once again. The news washed over him and he felt desperate to see her, for he longed to see her face and to admire her on the pedestal which he had placed her on that day they had first met. "You know, from the Rising…"

"The Rising Sun, New York City, I know!" Dick said cutting Lewis off.

"You're interested in her, then?" Lewis said, prying. Lewis Nixon was good at prying.

"Who wouldn't be? Ask yourself that." Dick answered quietly as he thought of the way she mechanically poured drinks. He saw that look in her eyes, like this was not where she had intended to be. He wondered what brought her out to England – to Aldbourne, of all places. He wondered why she was within feet of him. He wondered whether or not she thought of him, whether or not she even remembered him.

"She asked about you." Lewis added. "Well, you know, after she asked of me, of course."

Dick shot him a look of curious doubt.

"She emphasized your name, though!" Lewis added, as he lit a cigarette and smoked it. Silence followed, as Lewis felt a sense of peace wash over him. He hadn't felt this way in a long time.

"Maybe I'll stop in that pub sometime, then." Dick mused out loud, not caring if he sounded silly. Lewis shot him a look of surprise. "For coffee, or something." Dick added. He didn't drink. He would not drink, he would not succumb.

"There's a first time for everything, Dick."

"I'll give it a try when you can put that flask down for a week." Dick added, knowing that it would never happen.

"Touche, Dick. Touche." Lewis said quietly. He then looked to Dick. The sun was setting over the sleepy English town. "I'll hold you to that, you know. Until the day I die."

x.x.x.x.x.

Faye laid in bed in her new room after her first shift of work. She had been victorious – bringing in a record profit for the pub. Mr. Bartleby was impressed and agreed to have her on full time. Faye looked at the oil lamp that sat next to her bed, on the nightstand. The cottage was mostly furnished. It had been rented out by an elderly woman who now lived with her eldest daughter in a bigger house in Swindon proper. The room was small, but it was homely. The lamp reminded her of Oklahoma and the wallpaper reminded her of what Louis XIV would have done had he been on a strict budget.

As Faye curled up in her bed, she wondered whether or not Dick Winters was thinking of her at all. She wondered what he had done tonight and where he had gone. She wondered about the people he interacted with and the type of man, whether or not he was a leader. When he walked into the Rising Sun the other day, he struck her as a leader. She envisioned him gallantly leading troops into battle and making sure everything progressed according to plan. She thought of him as slowly drifted off to sleep.


	5. V

**Author's Note:** I'm glad everybody is enjoying this story. Thanks for the great reviews – they mean a lot and they certainly provide inspiration for further chapters. I've been suffering a lot from writer's block lately, which explains my lack of updating…

Now for some corrections… In the first two chapters of this story, I mention Faye as being from Kansas. Then, I switch to Oklahoma. Bottom line: she's from Oklahoma, because I said so. When I get further on through this story I'm going to make corrections to deal with continuity issues such as that.

And… Cobb isn't evil, but after the drunken antics we've seen in BoB I feel safe putting him in that "drunk jerk" position. On with it then…

V.

Electricity is actually made up of extremely tiny particles called electrons, that you cannot see with the naked eye unless you have been drinking.

_Dave Barry, The Taming of the Screw_

It had taken him a good few weeks to work up the courage to walk into the Queen Vic with his head held high. Though he was no cowardly man, Dick felt as if Faye's eyes had the ability to stare deep down into him and see through his soul. A few men had raised their eyebrows as Dick walked into the smoky pub.

He heard a loud whisper behind him as he walked toward the bar top.

"_Fellas, I bet this is the first time he's walked into a joint like this." "So much for a Quaker, eh?" "You owe me a beer, jerk off." "And that twenty dollars you wagered? It's got my name all over it!"_

He chuckled to himself as he continued walking. He had quite a reputation. He took a seat and picked up the newspaper that he knew Faye had placed on the bar. The thought of her cherry red lips and dark blue eyes made him feel uncharacteristically male and muscular in comparison – the very thought of this feeling turned him on and instilled within him a sense of power.

Faye had seen him walk in and she had seen the men's heads turn. She had watched him sit down and pick up the newspaper. She always put newspapers on her bar top. She walked over in her plain grey dress and stood in front of him. Sensing a presence in front of him, he raised his head.

"Fancy seeing you here, Richard Winters." Faye said evenly. He watched the words slip out of her red lips and he smiled slightly.

"Faye Murdoch, it's a pleasure." Confidence oozed from the man that sat before Faye. Nobody called him Richard. Nobody.

"Have you come to brave the liquor cabinet, Lieutenant?" She said jokingly, all the while treading carefully.

"If by the liquor cabinet you mean a cup of nice coffee, then yes." He was sarcastic yet serious. Faye was impressed by his fortitude.

"I don't know how nice that cup will be, but I'll see what I can do." Faye looked at him deeply. "Still a teetotaler, then? Wait 'til you get into combat."

"And you seem to be sure of that, Ms. Murdoch…" Dick said with a smile. He put down the newspaper and looked at her intently.

"My brother was a teetotaler until he went to North Africa…" Faye said with a serious look in her eyes.

"And?" Dick inquired, wondering what became of him.

"He's an alcoholic." She said this with a dead serious look in her eyes. Dick raised his eyebrows.

"Really?"

"No, I'm just joking with you." Dick laughed when he heard her sweet voice. She smiled and then gave him a semi-serious look. "Forgive me if I'm being a bit too bold, but why do you abstain from liquor?" Dick was taken aback by her question, as it was a question that people simply did not ask. They merely made assumptions and judgments.

"I just never felt the need to drink." His answer was honest and he said this softly. "And judging by what I see around me, I don't feel like I'm at any loss."

"Fair enough." Faye said with a smile. "The coffee's about ready. I would ask you how you take it, but there's only one way we serve it here and that's black without sugar."

"Tough times, eh?" Dick said huskily.

"Something like that." Faye walked over to small pot that resembled a kettle and began to pour its hot contents into a coffee cup. She placed the cup delicately on its accompanying saucer and walked over to Dick, placing the cup in front of him. "This isn't New York coffee by any means, but it will suffice."

"Please, Faye. This is fine." He looked at her and smiled cheekily as he raised the cup to his lips. "It doesn't even matter if it's little better than paint thinner – the Queen Vic and the Mess Hall are the only game in town." _But looking at you is better than looking at a bunch of men in sweaty uniforms, Faye. _

"Hey sugar! I need a beer!" shouted a semi-drunk trooper at the edge of the bar. Dick looked down the bar and saw the man – he felt a sense of disgust. Faye looked visibly annoyed, for she hated when men talked down to her like that. His voice had been abrasive, harsh, and disrespectful. Faye ignored the man; her name was not Sugar.

"Are you deaf?! I said I need a beer!" the man shouted again, almost spitting on the bar as he did so.

Dick did not know the man, but he knew that he hated him. He hated the way he looked at Faye – with that drunk, lusty look in his eyes – and he hated the way he talked to Faye – with the loud and abrasive voice that he had.

"Excuse me?" Faye asked politely. "That's no way to address a lady."

"And you ain't a lady, workin' here!" the man bellowed. Dick placed his coffee down on the bar top and rose from his seat.

"Dick, don't worry about it." Faye said quietly. "People like him are never worth it."

Dick gave her a look of steel and walked over to the drunken soldier.

"Trooper." He said this sternly and without room for back talk. He recognize the man from Easy Company.

"Sir…" He stumbled, slurring his words.

"Cobb." Dick said loudly and harshly looking at the man's uniform. "You salute your superior officers." Dick looked down at him with an icy gaze. The man slowly began to pull himself together as he stumbled and saluted the Lieutenant that stood before him.

"I'll be damned if I hear you disrespecting a woman while you're wearing that uniform, Cobb. I'll be damned." Cobb was surprised to hear the strong words from Winters' mouth – he had heard that Winters was a teetotaler, less tough than other officers, more understanding…

"At ease." Winters ordered. "And please let it be known, Cobb, that you aren't to talk to that woman behind the bar. That's an order – and if you disobey, I'll demote your ass so far down you won't know where you landed." Cobb's eyes widened and he walked away from the bar top sulking.

Faye lit a cigarette as she stood watching the empty space that once harbored the drunken trooper's body. She was not shaken, for she had seen it all before – she worked in New York, damn it. She was taken aback, though, by Dick defending her. Nobody ever defended her. She usually handled herself pretty well – perhaps, though, it was because she never had anybody to defend her in the first place. It was always her against the world.

Dick walked back to his seat and sat down. He returned to his cup of coffee. Faye raised an eyebrow and slightly pouted her cherry red lips.

"I was going to say avoid heroics, but you beat me to it, trooper." She dropped the dying ashes from her cigarette into the ashtray that stood near Dick's black coffee. "Thank you." She said this softly. Dick looked into her eyes and saw before him a vulnerable woman who had worked so hard to build up her defenses in order to remain strong.

Faye smoked her cigarette in silence as she watched Dick drink his coffee. They had a quiet moment of understanding that was broken only by the faint sound of a young man behind Dick.

"Lieutenant Winters." The man said softly.

"Yes trooper?"

"Your presence is needed at Regiment." Dick thanked the runner for the message and then looked up at Faye.

"Well, I suppose I'll see you another time, then."

"It shouldn't be too hard to find me, Dick." Faye said sarcastically. Dick threw her a sultry smile, gave her some money for the coffee, and then walked off.

Faye looked at three dollars that Dick had placed on the table next to the empty coffee cup. She smiled to herself as she put the money in her apron pocket, sighing.

x.x.x.x.x.x.

The months of September and October passed by quickly. Faye tended bar at the Queen Vic almost religiously, though never on Sundays. She was always busy, silently putting away her money. Dick would come in three times a week to have his cup of coffee, nothing more, nothing less. He always left her three dollars. Coffee was less than fifty cents – much less. She tried to protest, but he would not stop.

November was marked by colder and wetter weather. The cold of New York City was nothing like this – for this cold was damp and bone chilling. Oklahoma's warmth was nothing but a faint flame in her memory.

Faye sat at the bar on a chilly afternoon in late November looking over an old crossword puzzle that she had not been able to solve. Sighing, she gained no inspiration from the dull sound of the radio or the light chatter among the pub's few patrons. When the men were busy with training, there proved little to do in the bar but wait for the men to come in. The townspeople still frequented the Queen Vic, but they were easy – rarely requesting extravagant or complicated drinks, never really having a deadline looming over their heads. Time only mattered when the American and Canadian soldiers were in the bar, Faye mused.

Faye's face lit up as Dick walked into the smoky pub. Whereas men used to be surprised at the sight of their favorite "Mennonite" striding into the Queen Vic, the surprise faded as this became a regular occurrence. Dick looked slightly tired – but nothing a cup of bad coffee and conversation with Faye couldn't fix.

Dick pulled up a stool as Faye put down her crossword puzzle and took a sip from her own black coffee.

"Busy day?" She inquired, making light conversation.

"Nothing out of the ordinary."

"That's a good thing, then?"

"I guess you could call it that." Faye poured Dick a cup of the coffee as he answered her. She placed it in front of him and offered him the paper. "No, I can't bear to read another piece of paper."

"Ah, they had you playing office boy." Faye joked.

"Something to that effect." Dick took a sip of the coffee which was strong and overly bitter. "Bad as usual, eh? They don't give you much to work with here."

"It's not my fault the English made their empire based on tea, tobacco, and opium! They don't know a damned thing about coffee, Dick." Faye joked, feigning disgust at the mention of tea.

The jovial moment was interrupted by the Queen Vic's door loudly opening and then slamming shut. Angie came running through the bar in her nurse uniform, clearly on a short break from her day's work.

"Faye!" Angie said as she got to the bar top.

"Good afternoon, Angie." Faye responded, hoping that Angie's way of creating awkward situations would not manifest itself. "How can _I _be of service?"

"Thanksgiving is this Thursday." Angie stated plainly.

"I must have forgotten." Faye said, feigning ignorance.

"I'll bet you forgot on purpose." Angie answered, knowing Faye all too well.

"I must have forgotten to make it less obvious, then." Faye said as she lit a cigarette and smoked it slowly. "Why are you bringing this up?"

"I've invited Sam over to the house for Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday." Faye coughed on her cigarette smoke as she heard this.

"You what?!"

"I've invited Sam…"

"Why would you do that?" Faye cut Angie off.

"Thanksgiving! It's a time for family!"

"When were you planning on telling me about this bombshell? It's only two days until Thanksgiving. Who the hell do you think is going to prepare the meal, then?"

"I was hoping that…" Angie started.

"You were hoping that I would somehow acquire a bird and then cook the living hell out of it! That's what you were hoping!"

Realizing that she was caught, Angie revealed her intentions. "You're right." She sighed. "I've just been so busy at work, what with the recent influx of soldiers…"

"Oh God damn it, Angie! It's really fresh, isn't it – the way you have a knack for volunteering me for a bunch of your harebrained schemes!"

"Faye, I'd hardly call Thanksgiving a harebrained scheme of mine…"

"What, are you going to blame the pilgrims now?!" Faye sighed loudly and took another sharp breath from her Lucky Strike. "Oh God damn it, get the hell out of my bar!"

Before Angie walked away, she smiled slightly and raised her voice.

"So that's a yes, then?" Angie asked sweetly. "I mean, I'll owe you… I'm fine with, you know, owing you…"

"Get your ass out of this bar before that imposed yes turns into a no."

And that was how Faye Murdoch assumed control over cooking a Thanksgiving dinner that Thursday. She had learned a few tricks from her mother Marlene, of course, but she wasn't about to divulge any of that to Angie. She wanted Angie to think that this was going to be some big grand effort – which only made claiming whatever Angie said she'd "owe her" all the more sweet.

Dick laughed slightly as he watched Faye angrily smoke in front of him.

"What, you don't have anything to be thankful for?" Dick joked as he sipped from his coffee.

"It's not that." Faye countered. "She's just always so…"

"Impulsive? Slightly selfish without realizing it? Childish, even?"

"Precisely." Faye sighed. "Oh damn it, Dick, do you want to come to this Thanksgiving dinner which I'll apparently be cooking?"

"I don't know if it would be best…" he started, wondering if it would be awkward or even appropriate.

"Dick, if I have to sit at a dinner table with Angie and Sam all over each other, it's not going to end well." Faye looked at him innocently. With her cherry red lips parted slightly and her blue eyes all wide, he felt like it would have been downright wrong for him to even consider saying no. He felt privileged to have been asked such a question by her – no, he felt privileged to be considered as the man who she could rely on to get her out of such an annoying situation.

"Alright, alright." Dick said. Faye smiled widely as she heard those words.

And that was how Richard Winters found himself invited to a Thanksgiving dinner in the middle of England.


	6. VI

**Author's Note:** Here is that Thanksgiving Dinner we've all been waiting for. Please please please leave a review if you're reading this and somehow find it enjoyable (or even if you dislike it). Comments are appreciated and are certainly motivational in terms of keeping the writing process going.

This chapter has an M rating. I'm operating under the assumption that this shouldn't be a problem…

**VI.  
**The awful daring of a moment's surrender  
Which an age of prudence can never retract  
By this, and this only, we have existed

_T.S. Eliot_

The faint aroma of slightly burning turkey swam through the small cottage. Faye sat smoking a cigarette at the dining room table, looking over an old fashion magazine. As the room felt hotter, Faye looked to the kitchen and felt a sudden sense of panic.

"Shit!" she exclaimed, jumping from her chair and going over to the stove. She hoisted the small bird out from the oven and gazed over its charred edges. "Oh God damn it!" She pounded a fist on the countertop in frustration. Thinking quickly, she furiously began to stir the gravy that was on the stove top. She had decided that she would drench the turkey in gravy in an attempt to hide the fact that it was _slightly_ over cooked.

Not that she felt bad, though. Angie had made a bed for her and Faye refused to lay in it. Smirking slightly, Faye looked over to the counter gazing over the cranberry sauce and stuffing that were in their serving bowls.

As she finalized the poor excuse for a Thanksgiving dinner, Faye turned off the oven and proceeded to run to her room. Taking off her apron and throwing it into the hamper, Faye quickly pulled on a dark purple dress. Not wanting her arms to be bare, she carefully put on a cream colored cashmere shawl – a random gift from Mr. Bartleby's wife in exchange for extra food items. She applied light make up and took her hair out of curlers. She dabbed light perfume on her wrists and neck, looking at herself in the mirror as she performed this ritual. She had been thinner, she noticed. Thinner and more tired. Not wanting to dwell on these things, she hastily left her room and commenced setting the dining room table.

She artfully prepared four place settings and began to bring the food over to the table. She had hoped that the lovely table display would detract from the otherwise unsavory meal. Faye had three bottles of wine and a good bottle of scotch in the kitchen – also acting as weapons to disguise the overdone bird.

The door to the cottage opened loudly. Faye looked to the door and saw Angie arm in arm with her husband, Sam. He looked rather sharp in his formal uniform… but not as good as Dick did, she thought. Nobody looked as good as Dick in his formal uniform. Nobody.

"Good evening." Sam said smiling, most likely unaware that Faye had been pressured by his loving wife into creating the meal that he was about to eat. After Angie and Sam entered, they politely closed the door behind them.

"I'm so happy to have you over, Sam. It's a pity, you know, being your sister in law and having barely seen you!" Faye said with a fake smile on her face. _Wait 'til that bastard eats the bird, _she thought smugly. Angie smiled, hoping that Faye would be on her best behavior. They didn't hate each other – they had just grown weary of each other. Faye was weary of Angie's selfish antics, while Angie was slightly jealous of Faye. Faye had a niche in life; Faye knew herself. Angie was desperately searching for her purpose and she wanted so very badly to make sense of everything; these things often blinded her.

A knock on the door caused Faye to smile. She walked quickly past Angie, opening the door. Dick stood in the doorway in his formal uniform – looking better than Sam did in his, as Faye had thought of earlier.

"Dick." Faye said warmly. "I'm so glad you could make it." Dick's heart flew with the words that he had heard escape from Faye's cherry red lips.

"Well, it would have been rude to refuse such a compelling invitation…" Dick started, looking deeply into her eyes. Faye took in his height and his masculinity – his chiseled facial features and the way in which he was able to command such a presence before her.

"Do come in!" Faye said blushing, as she realized that she had been staring at the man before her. Dick smiled slightly and walked into the room.

"It smells delicious." Sam said, as they waited in the living room.

"Why thank you!" Faye exclaimed, throwing Dick a wink. Dick wondered what trick Faye had up her sleeve. "Dick, I would like you to meet Sam, my brother in law. Sam, this is Dick – he's from Easy Company." Dick raised an eyebrow.

"Pleasure to meet you, Sam." As Dick said this, Sam took note of his higher rank and prepared to salute him. Dick shook his head and continued. "No need for that – not tonight."

"Good to meet you as well, Dick." Sam said, extending his hand out to Dick's. Dick shook his hand firmly.

"They're married you know," Faye said seductively to Dick. "That makes her an honest woman." Angie coughed when she heard this. "But, then again… honesty is in the eye of the beholder." Faye added this quietly to Dick, making sure that Angie and Sam did not hear her. Dick chuckled to himself. Faye led her three guests to the table and sat down.

"This looks great, Faye. You really went out of your way." Dick said, going through all of the formalities. He knew the turkey smelled burnt, for it was not the way in which his mother made it each year. He was polite, regardless.

The four diners filled their plates with burnt and heavily gravy saturated turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and mashed potatoes. Even Faye had to admit that everything but the turkey was great. Angie didn't know good home cooking from a hole in the wall, so it didn't matter.

"Silly me!" Faye exclaimed as she looked at the empty wine glasses that sat in front of the plates. "I forgot to get the wine from the kitchen!" Before Dick could protest, Faye jumped from her seat and found the bottle that she had wanted. Dick heard a cork pop lightly. Seconds later Faye returned to the dining room with the open bottle in hand.

Faye prepared to pour four glasses. When she finished pouring for Angie and Sam, she attempted to pour Dick a glass.

"That won't be necessary." Dick said firmly. He would not capitulate. As Faye heard him deny her silent request, she grew slightly aroused. Dick's strength of made her weak in the knees.

"No bother, then." Faye commented lightly, placing the bottle in the middle of the table.

The dinner continued rather pleasantly, with no complaining from the diners about the state of the turkey. The four exchanged stories of the past month's experiences, even sharing a few laughs.

As the dinner concluded, Faye rose from the table and began to clear some of the plates.

"Angie, could you be a dear and help me with some of the leftovers?" Faye asked her cousin sweetly. "I'll see you in the kitchen." Faye said, not waiting for Angie to answer her.

Moments later, Angie appeared with the turkey and cranberry sauce plates.

"Angie." Faye said slyly. "I recall we had an arrangement…"

"Yes?" Angie asked innocently.

"Aye, an arrangement. I recall you said that you would _owe me one_." Angie gulped when she heard Faye's words. "There's a film being shown for the troopers tonight. You have a date with Sam."

"You like this guy, then?" Angie said sweetly.

"You have a date in five minutes, Angie. Be spontaneous, make it snappy, and get out of my hair for tonight." Faye looked at her cousin pleadingly. "Please. You owe me." Angie smiled slightly, aware that she owed Faye far more in terms of the sacrifices that Faye had made for her.

Faye and Angie returned to the dining room to find Dick and Sam making small talk about the differences between B and E Company.

"Sam, I believe we'll be late for our date if we don't leave now…" Angie started quickly.

"Our date?"

"Yes babe, I planned it ahead but I got side tracked with all of the excitement here." Angie said, putting on her coat. Dick smirked as he watched Sam rise from his seat with no choice but to follow his wife.

"You kids have fun, okay?" Faye said innocently, pretending that she had been surprised by the whole thing. Angie and Sam quickly made their exit into the night.

Dick looked at the woman that stood before him. Her purple dress brought out her blue eyes – he found them intoxicating beyond belief. He needed no liquor if he had her eyes. Her eyes were enough.

"Will you meet me in the sitting room, Dick?" Faye asked seductively. "I would enjoy it very much." Faye said quietly. Dick rose from his seat and stood in front of Faye. He was easily a foot taller her and much larger – his muscular frame stood out in comparison to her smaller, yet curvaceous body. "I'll join you in a moment." Faye left him few options. Dick went into the sitting room and sat down on the small loveseat that was in front of the fireplace.

Faye took two wine glasses and the opened bottle of merlot into the sitting room. She walked over to the love seat and sat down. Faye poured two glasses of wine and handed one of them to Dick.

"Faye, I'm not sure this is necessary…" He said, unsure of whether or not he should sip the dark red liquid.

"You won't even have a glass of wine?" Faye purred. She had wanted to seduce him from the moment she first saw him – from the first time he walked into the Rising Sun. She looked into his eyes and saw a man that would not cede control to her. This only made her want him more—his reluctance, his defiance, his denial. It made her wet and instilled within her a deep sense of yearning. "Angie and Sam have left, Dick. Drink some wine with me in front of the fire. I won't tell Lieutenant Nixon on you."

Dick lightly chuckled as he heard her joke. "I shouldn't overstay…" he started, unsure of how to approach the situation that had just unfolded itself.

"Overstay your welcome? Please." Faye said quietly as she looked at him intently. "I want you to stay. Have some wine. The glass is already poured and I wouldn't want it to go to waste…"

"You're very compelling, Faye." Dick said as he held is wine glass and looked at the woman that sat on the sofa next to him. Dick made a decision at that very moment that would alter the course of his life. He lifted the wine glass slowly to his lips and took a sip from the ornate glass that Faye had so eagerly given him. The red velvet liquid ran down his throat and warmed his body. Faye smiled and rose from the sofa to put a log on the fire. Dick took her in – her dress was figure hugging and dark purple, the color of royalty. He imagined she could have been queen of Oklahoma, presiding over a grand ranch and owning many horses. He envisioned her at a large table in a country inn, flirtatious with her hospitality and serious with her conversations. He watched the rising of her chest and the way her breasts slowly rose with every breath she took.

Faye sat on the carpet in front of the sofa and took in the warmth of the fire. She took a sip from her wine glass, and turned to look at Dick. The cherry red of her lips was stained faintly by the dark velvet merlot. Dick wanted to lick the wine clean from her lips.

He had not expected to enjoy the wine was he did, nor did he expect the lack of weakness he felt as he slowly imbibed. He felt a sense of joy that Faye would want to share this bottle with him in front of her fireplace. He felt a sense of privilege that he was the one seeing the slight movements of her chest as he breathed the musky, intoxicating air.

"I've never seen you out of uniform," Faye said in a silky voice. If he was the blushing type, Dick's cheeks would have turned red. Instead, blood and intensity rushed to his swelling sex as he contemplated the double entendre that Faye had so readily presented before him. "Most men look the same in uniform," she continued. "You don't, though. You're different."

Dick looked at her as she sat calmly on the carpet in front of the fire. She looked at him invitingly. Needing no verbal invitation, Dick moved from his sofa to the carpet and joined her.

He looked at her deeply and watched as she continued speaking.

"I feel like I can see through the uniform. I know who you are." Faye took a sip from her wine and looked into his eyes.

"That's quite a bold statement," he said in a serious tone. "You have me all figured out, then?"

"Precisely!" Faye said with a slight smile. "You're like gin and tonic after a lime's been squeezed over it." He laughed lightly as she said it. "No, I'm serious, Dick!" She said, sensing his disbelief.

"Gin and tonic. Seems so simple, right?" She looked into his eyes deeply. "Wrong. You're the best gin there is, only the most top shelf gin. And the flavors are layered and complex, begging to be understood and tasted." As he heard her velvet words, he felt his arousal swell further. "The tonic water chases the gin and dances with it, letting one savor you better. And the fresh squeezed lime juice – it's the coup de grace. The others who claim to be made of such compounds only have the lime as a garnish, a façade. Your lime is squeezed, adding unmatched intensity and fervor. It's rare and unique, and above all…" Faye stroked his shoulder as she continued. "Powerful." Faye seemed so sure and so correct, Dick thought. "And that is what you are, Richard. That is what you are made of." Dick could hear her slight Oklahoma drawl creep through her words.

Faye's eyes looked full of intensity and seduction as she took a slow sip from her glass of wine. She was different from the women he had been raised around, Dick realized. She was different. It was the way she wore her hair – down and flowing without restraint, the way she subtly highlighted her face with makeup, and the way her voice was soft and melodious. Her accent varied depending on the fervor of her emotions – Dick realized that when he heard the faint sounds of Oklahoma, he heard what Faye was truly thinking and feeling. There were parts of her, he realized, that were privy only to him.

"So, what do you say, Richard?" Faye inquired, placing emphasis on Dick's name. "Have I painted an appropriate picture of you?"

Dick raised an eyebrow and smirked slightly.

"You sound like you've had gin and tonic before…" he said with a deep voice.

"Maybe I have." Faye finished her wine and noticed that Dick had already done the same.

"And how did it agree with you?" Dick asked, moving closer to her. He wondered why he was being so bold. He wondered whether or not it was the wine – but then he quickly realized that it wasn't. He wanted her.

"It tasted very good, if that's what you mean." Faye said seductively. "I mean to say that it… _satisfied_ me." With her words, Dick could feel his arousal swelling further, making his trousers uncomfortable. "And if you are gin and tonic, Richard, what do you fancy I am?" Faye inched closer to Dick's body as she said these words. Less than a foot separated their bodies on the floor, in front of the fire.

Dick pushed aside any boundaries he had set earlier. He looked into her eyes and said something that made her shiver and throb with arousal.

"You're dark, intense, and you're like velvet." His face was mere inches from hers. He leaned in and he could feel her lustful breath on his lips. "_Merlot_."

When he had knocked on her door earlier that evening, he had not expected to kiss her. He had thought about it – hell, he had thought about it. He thought about what her lips would taste like since the moment he first saw her. Maybe it was fate – maybe it was destiny. He wasn't sure and it didn't matter. All he knew was that the merlot was warm and had injected velvet confidence which pulsed through his body… and he felt to be himself again.

The merlot which stained her cherry lips faded as Dick touched her. Faye parted her lips and her tongue lightly darted against his lower lip, begging for entry. Submitting, Dick's tongue danced with hers at a rate which grew in intensity and fervor. He broke from her lips and turned his attention to her delicate neck. He could hear light sensuous moans from the woman before him.

Faye could feel herself fading into Dick's presence. This was what she had wanted and needed; this was what she longed for. And it was with his touch that she realized _he_ was what she had wanted all along – he was what she had desired and placed upon a pedestal since the moment she first ran into him in New York City months ago.

Dick moved from her neck and back to her lips, this time kissing her with even more intensity. He brought a hand to the strap of her dress and began to lightly tug it off of her shoulder. Pausing for a moment, he pulled away from Faye and looked into her eyes.

"This is what you want?"

"Do you really need to ask that?" Faye looked at Dick coyly. She took his hand in hers and rose from the floor. Dick did not need to be persuaded; he rose with her and followed her as she took him through the house and up the stairs to the second floor.

Faye opened the door to her bedroom and let Dick in after her. Without much warning, he slammed the door shut and pinned her against it. Faye moaned as he began to kiss her neck. She could feel him pressed up against her; it was evident from his swelling sex that he was highly aroused. He turned from her neck to her lips as he took his hands away from his body. He began to undress himself, a task which Faye soon began to help him with. After he was in nothing but his boxers, Faye looked down at his sculpted chest and took in his body. She could see the hardness that was concealed only by a thin piece of fabric and the sight made her wet.

"You're overdressed." Dick said huskily.

"And you'll help me?" Faye asked sweetly.

"Do you really need to ask that?" Dick responded, with sexy humor evident in his eyes. Faye gave him a low laugh. As she let her guard down, Dick's hands moved quickly to her dress and began to unzip it. Her dark purple dress fell to the floor and the silk pooled around her feet. She leaned against the wall only in her white lace underwear which left little to the imagination.

Dick wondered why she chose virgin white, because she seemed to have it all planned out. She had wanted him to spend the night, he knew, from the moment she invited him to dinner in the first place. Her outfit, her makeup, her hair, the drinks… the fireplace…it had all been planned – orchestrated, even, as if only to come to this climax. And she wasn't a virgin, he knew, nor was he… but the lace felt so wrong and so right at the same time… and he resolved that she had planned it to be so.

He took a hand and began to explore her body, while he pressed a hand against the door to support himself. He trailed his hand to her bra and stroked one of the cups, feeling the lace against his calloused hands. The faint ruffling of the lace clashed with his masculinity. Faye moaned lightly as he slid the same hand under the bra and felt her flesh. He found a rosy bud and pinched it slightly, causing Faye to fall onto him. The weight of her body against him drove him mad. Faye was dripping wet after Dick's exploration. She could feel the lace of her underwear grow moist. Her heightened sensitivity only made her throb more as she felt the lace of the bra rub against her hard nipples.

Dick pulled her toward the bed and placed Faye in front of him.

"You're still overdressed…" Dick stated, standing tall over the woman before him. Her lipstick was smudged over her lips, the evidence of wine, sensuality, and intense lust. Faye shivered as she felt the air from her open window flow over her naked skin. "And you're cold."

Dick reached behind Faye and unhooked her bra. As the white lace garment fell to the ground, Faye's breasts were liberated from their constraint. Dick began to play with her rosy nipples, teasing her with his fingers. His calloused fingers rubbing against her sensitive skin only made for more intense sensations. He trailed his fingers down to her panties, which he pulled down past her thighs.

Taking a finger, he traced around her inner thighs. He could feel her breaths become heavier and she was at his mercy. He drew a finger closer and began to rub against her most sensitive region, causing her to moan loudly. Sliding a finger into her wet channel, Faye gasped at a sensation that she had not felt in a long time.

"You're hot and wet, Faye." Dick stated. "Fancy that… Get on the bed…" Faye moved to the bed and Dick followed her.

He continued to stroke against her with his fingers, causing her to moan louder.

"You're such a tease, damn it!" she moaned as he still played with her.

"Tell me what you need and you'll get it." He said with a serious and strong voice, as he continued to stroke against her. "Explicitly." As he made his request, his fingers began to move faster with anticipation. Faye could barely think straight.

"I need…" she started, only to be interrupted by her own loud moans. The thought of stringing together words was near impossible as she felt the intense sensation of Dick playing with her clit.

"You need…" Dick supplied, urging her to continue.

"I need… you…" She added as he stroked her further.

"And what do you need me for, Miss Murdoch?" Dick looked into her eyes as he continued to stroke her. "What do you need me to do for you?"

"I need you… to…" Faye moaned loudly and gasped as she felt herself nearing the edge.

"Continue… And you'll get what you want." _That bastard!_ Faye thought to herself as she desperately tried to force words to come out of her lips.

"I need you to fuck me!" she said loudly and quickly as he continued to stroke her.

"Ah, the truth is out…" Dick said in charge. "But I couldn't understand you, Faye. Perhaps you could say it again… slowly." Dick showed her no mercy as he continued to stroke her with even more intensity. He slid two fingers into her wet channel causing her to moan even louder. "Looks like you're pretty close… so tight and wet…"

"Richard…" she started. He slid his fingers out of her wetness and continued to stroke her clit, this time even more rapidly. Faye could feel herself being pushed over the edge. "Richard… Please!" He continued to stroke her quickly as he used his other hand to pinch at her nipples. "Oh my God… Please…" Faye shouted out to the air as Dick continued with his work.

"Come for me." He said with authority. This was an order. He rubbed against her with even more intensity and he continued to play with her hard rosy tips. Faye felt herself going over the edge. Her toes began to curl and she could feel an indescribable wave of light wash over her body, causing her to shake and fiercely moan.

Faye could feel Dick blowing cold air onto her body, causing her to shiver. He leaned against her, pressing his hardness onto her body.

"And what did you need, Miss Murdoch?" he asked huskily, this time with little desire to wait.

"I need you to fuck me, Richard." Faye answered softly and sweetly. Her sweetness was betrayed by her naughty thoughts and the wetness that she still felt in between her legs.

"I can arrange that." Dick answered with a sense of authority.

Faye had not intended for this to turn out the way it did, in all honesty. She had told him he was like a gin and tonic with fresh squeezed lime – but she had not expected that he would act like this. She knew he was a man of fortitude, a man of strength, a man of will… but she had not known or expected that he would pin her against a door and arouse her in such a way.

Faye's thoughts were interrupted as she felt Dick's tongue against her wetness. She moaned lightly at the surprising sensation.

"You taste good."

"Yeah?" When she asked him this she could feel that her Oklahoma accent was out in full force. As she asked this he took off his boxers and Faye saw him fully naked before her. He was certainly larger than any made she had ever been with before and the sight surprised her. Dick looked at her with a sense of amusement, which he quickly disguised.

"Very good." Dick pulled himself up and kissed against Faye's neck. He rubbed his erection against her wetness and she shivered. "And now you'll get what you want, Miss Murdoch."

Without any other words or warning, Dick pushed himself into Faye's wetness. She had grown so tight, he sighed to himself, as he pushed himself further into her. She was wetter and tighter than any woman he had been with before. Perhaps, he thought, this was the first _woman _he had been with. He thrust with increasing intensity and speed as he pushed the thoughts out of his head. He could feel Faye moan underneath him. Her hair had grown wet with sweat and he could see that she had closed her eyes with pleasure. Smirking, he began to thrust intensely into her, causing her to open her eyes. Her blue eyes widened and he continued to smirk as he thrust even harder.

Dick pulled her legs up slightly to get a better angle. He wanted her to come again, more intensely. He wanted to feel her wetness envelop him and push him over the edge.

The new angle had made Faye feel even more sensation. She could hear Dick moan as he pushed himself into her; she could hear him moan louder as she rocked her hips in conjunction with his thrusts. She could feel intense pleasure that she had not felt before. Wrapping her legs around Dick's body, she knew that she would come soon.

He pushed into her with intensity, desperation, and, above all, lust. Taking Faye by surprise, he used a free hand to rub against her clit rapidly as he continued to thrust.

"Richard…" Faye began to pant as his name slipped out of her stained lips. "Please…" He forcefully pushed himself into her, now holding nothing back, as he sought to give her the release which she had so desperately sought. Continuing to rub up against her, he knew that he would not be able to hold on much longer.

"Oh my God…" Faye screamed into the air as the intense sensation of orgasm washed over her sweat-soaked body. Unable to hold on at all, Dick came into her wetness. Faye released her legs from his body and he fell beside her on the bed. Panting, the two laid in silence on the bed.

After a few moments, Faye rose from the bed and quickly ran downstairs to use the bathroom and grab a glass of water. Quickly returning to her bedroom, she closed the door and placed the glass of water on her night table.

Faye slipped under the covers of her bed and Dick followed suit. With no words, they drifted off to sleep in each other's arms.


	7. VII

**Author's Note: **Finally, we have an update! Thanks for sticking with this story. If you're reading, please leave me a review and let me know what you think.

**VII.**

_Do I dare__  
__Disturb the universe?__  
__In a minute there is time__  
__For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse._

T.S. Eliot

Faye tapped her pen over her crossword puzzle, her mind lingering on the last few clues she had yet to solve. The bar was quiet at four in the afternoon, as many of the townspeople were either working or in their homes preparing for dinner. Faye took a sip from her cup of black coffee as she continued to stare down her puzzle as if it had wronged her.

It had been two months since that Thanksgiving dinner. Faye never spoke with Dick about their late night transaction. The expression of lust went unmentioned, though it continued throughout the weeks and months that followed. Faye never asked Dick to be exclusive with her, as she didn't want to trap him or force him into a relationship; Dick did the same. Faye answered none of Angie's questions, while Dick shrugged his shoulders when Lewis Nixon asked him for answers. Dick, however, always managed to retreat back to Faye's house whenever he could.

As Faye sat drinking her coffee and glaring at her crossword puzzle, she thought about what she wanted. She sighed as she realized that she had absolutely no idea. She wondered why the hell she even decided to stay in England. It all boiled down to being in between a rock and a hard place… and simply going with the flow. Deep down, she hated that. She had always prided herself on being a free spirit, yet none of the recent decisions she had to make – aside from being with Dick – had been of her own volition.

"Ya think a lot, y'know that?" piped a raspy voice at the bar. Faye looked to her right and saw the man who had broken the silence. "Ya dun know the answer, ya dun know the answer." He said in a folksy English accent.

"That's the problem, sir." Faye remarked. "I do know the answer… but I just can't damn well think of it." She placed the crossword puzzle down on the bar and went to refill her cup of coffee. Moments of silence transpired and she continued to look at the puzzle.

"Starin' at it ain't gonna help ye." The old man piped up once again.

"Neither is bitchin' about it, I guess." Faye said, throwing her pen down onto the bar. "Oh well, I'll tackle it tomorrow."

"Now, if ya dun mind me askin', how does a Yank such as yaself end up workin' in his pub?" The man lit the tobacco in his pipe and began to smoke it.

"You have all day?" Faye quipped, smirking.

"Time's all I got." The man remarked.

"You listen to my bitchin' and that pint's on the house." Faye stated. The man smiled back at her kind gesture. "It all started when I was back in Oklahoma, on my family's ranch…" The old man listened heartily to Faye's tale.

The hours transpired as the two discussed their life stories to pass the time. There was plenty of laughter; the ashtray on the bar near filled up by the time their conversation died down. The dying down of the conversation, however, came as a surprise to Faye.

The door to the Queen Victoria burst open.

Faye cursed to herself as she saw the woman appear in the doorway.

"Is tha' Angie?" the old man whispered.

"That's the one!" Faye replied bitterly, looking down at the crossword puzzle which she had given up on.

"I'll be makin' ma leave." The man stated quietly. Faye looked up to meet the man's gaze – yet he was gone. Faye shook her head, wondering how she could have missed the man. She also realized that she never even knew his name.

Angie sauntered up to the bar in her nurse's uniform. She wore a nervous expression on her face, which worried Faye. Angie got to the bar and sat down on one of the stools.

"I wanted to tell you something, Faye."

"I don't think I can take much more. My hair is going to go gray." Faye remarked with a bitter voice.

"It's… well… this is pretty big." Angie said, looking down. She grabbed a cigarette and lit it. Faye understood the issue must have been intense, for Angie rarely smoked. "I've been assigned." Angie stated quietly. Faye felt like she could hear a pin drop after Angie said those words.

"You're… Wow… Where?" Faye asked, finding difficulty stringing words together. She was actually worried about her cousin.

"Italy."

"Holy shit." Faye said, dropping her cup of coffee onto the floor of the bar. "Fuck!" Faye dropped down to pick up the pieces of the broken china mug, cursing her clumsiness.

"Faye, please don't worry!" Angie exclaimed, shocked by Faye's reaction.

"That's just a… pretty big pill to swallow." Faye muttered, placing the pieces of the mug in the trash bin next to the bar taps. "A pretty big pill."

"It was… unexpected."

"Yeah. I'll bet… And Sam?"

"The Airborne is staying in England." Angie remarked bitterly, looking down at her box of cigarettes which lay on the bar top. "Don't know for how long…"

"When are you being sent to Italy?" Faye asked, cutting to the chase.

"In two days."

"Holy shit." Faye remarked, grabbing a cigarette out of Angie's box and lighting it.

&&

Faye sat at her dining room table alone. Angie was busy training… or perhaps, she was with Sam. Faye didn't much care for the specifics. She wondered what Angie would be doing in Italy and she wondered if it was safe or not. Faye recalled reading newspapers saying that the German army was dug deep in the hills of Italy, fighting savagely against waves of American troops attempting to take ground on the peninsula.

A cup of tea sat in front of Faye. The steam rose from it and danced through the air, sending a spiral of hot mist up to the high ceilings of the English cottage. Faye leaned back against her chair and extended her arms outward as a means of stretching the stress out of her body. She didn't know what to think.

Thousands of worries and thoughts swam through her mind. Faye could feel a migraine begin to come on, which caused her to moan with frustration. In two days, Angie would be gone and Faye would have difficulty affording the rent for the cottage. In two days, Angie would be gone and Faye would be, in essence, alone in a foreign country.

But then there was Dick, she mused while she took a sip from her tea. Did she love him?

_Love_. A strong word that Faye had rarely used. A word that seemed almost as foreign as England did.

"No, I don't." Faye said aloud, challenging the air that surrounded her. "I do not love Richard Winters." She said this with a strong tone, her words cutting through the empty space around her.

Dick had been training that evening. Faye went to bed alone.

In bed, she thought of the English children lying in their beds, protected from the world with their wool blankets and winter pajamas. She thought of the women who slept alone that night, almost used to the empty cold space next to them… the cold space that used to be the sleeping place of a male body full of life and vigor. The men were gone, however.

_We're all alone in the end, _Faye thought. _All of us._

&

**Author's Note: I promise more action in the next chapter! I pretty much have this story outlined right up until the bitter end. Don't forget to review!**


	8. VIII

Author's Note: Thanks for sticking with me. I appreciate reviews – the constructive criticism and the appreciation always help. It also feeds the muse. ;)

VIII.

"Real love stories never have endings." - Richard Bach

Faye sat by Angie's side the next day, looking over a small park which seemed untouched by the violence and bloodshed of war. The park bench had looked so lonely when they first sat down, as if everybody was busy making war or helping people make war. A few children ran about in the park flying kites and taking advantage of the rare clear blue sky. Faye watched a stray cat slyly stroll through the bushes on the edge of the park, most likely in search of its next bowl of milk.

"I've gone through a pack of cigarettes these past two days." Faye muttered, cocking an eyebrow up and looking at Angie. "I'm sure that's what the doctor would call… _bad._"

"There are worse things." Angie said, looking at Faye with a bitter smirk. "Like… I don't know, going into a warzone? Getting married on a whim? Dragging your cousin through hell only to leave her stranded in a foreign country?"

"Is that a bit of regret I sense?" Faye laughed as she held a cigarette lightly in her left hand. Faye was no longer angry with Angie. The previous day, when she had learned that Angie was going off to war, she realized that she didn't have it in her heart to be bitter.

"What I'm saying is that I'd rather have the pack every other day habit, if you know what I mean." Angie looked into Faye's eyes; Faye could see into her soul. No, Faye reaffirmed – there was no anger or bitterness. There was no regret or pain or selfishness. There was the park bench, the small yet green park, and the children playing as if no war existed. There were the munitions factories, the full pubs and the bars, the cozy restaurants, and the sleepy cottages dotting the countryside. There was no room for anger – not in the midst of any of that. There as nothing but a silent reverence for the past and a desperate yearning for the future.

"You know, I want you to write me." Faye stated, looking over the birds at the park's small pond.

"Will you stay here?" Angie asked with a sense of curiosity.

"I don't know." Faye replied, looking down at the ground. "Whichever way the wind blows… some hokey Midwestern, Southern, whatever bullshit. The kind you store in the cupboard with the Bible and the shotgun. That sort of bullshit." Faye rubbed her high heels into the dirt under the bench, as if to stress her point. "I don't know. I don't know anything."

"Faye, I think you can do anything." Angie said, almost randomly. She pulled a cigarette out of Faye's box, which caused Faye to smirk. "I think there's something to be said about coming to New York from the middle of nowhere… and then, there's something to be said about _making_ it in New York with nothing but the shirt on your back, a box of cigarettes, and some random crap your mother taught you back on her ranch."

"Is that a compliment, Mrs. Andrews?" Faye inquired, still smirking.

"I believe it is, Ms. Murdoch."

The two sat on that park bench smoking cigarettes for the better part of three hours. They sat there mainly in silence, with the occasional discussion over a long lost memory that had been recently found. They laughed, but they did not dare cry – it wasn't the time for sorrow. The sky had been clear and blue; the birds had been loud; the children had been cheerful. It was probably the brightest day that Faye had ever observed in England, all truth be hold. Somewhere, deep within her very being, she found the strength and the inspiration to fully and completely smile.

The next day, Angie left. Again, there were no tears. There were no sobs and there was no regret. The car that would take Angie to the airfield was prompt. Years later, Faye would never forget the sight of Angie's black car retreating into the English countryside.

&&&&

Faye lay in bed with Dick days later. She could feel his fingers tracing the naked skin on her shoulder. She lay in front of him, facing her bedroom window which was open. The cold breeze blew into the room and caused the slightly sheer white curtains to billow out into her room. The night was late. Faye felt herself growing wet and anxious as Dick traced the skin on her arm.

Against her better judgment, Faye turned to face Dick. She hated getting lost in his eyes, which she felt could see through her very being. She could feel him assessing her emotions and reading her; she could feel his eyes penetrating her soul. Dick brought her face close to his and captured her lips. He nibbled lightly on her lower lip, causing her to moan with anticipation. Running his hands over her body, he pulled her close to him – up against him. Faye could feel his hardness pressed against her body, only causing her to grow with lust and life. Without any discussion, Dick pushed his hardness into Faye's naked body. They moved with each other and their movements grew with intensity.

Faye came twice – moaning out loudly with her toes curling. She bit down onto Dick's shoulder causing him to lose control of his lust. When Dick could no longer take it, he emptied himself into Faye. They collapsed against each other and spent the night as they usually did – side by side, shielded from the world by blankets and wet sticky sweat.

&&&&

The silence of the cottage felt oppressive, though Faye could never quite recall when she had actually shared the living room or dining room with Angie over the past few months. The silence would only be broken when Dick spent the night in her room, making Faye moan and squirm underneath him. The morning, however, would always bring forth another day of silence.

The quiet air of the cottage, however, paled in comparison to the boisterous pub in which Faye worked. The silence which she had grown so accustomed to faded away when Faye walked into the pub in the mid afternoon. She would watch as a sea of brown uniforms would wash into the pub; she could feel the light buzz in the air from the chatter that would begin to consume the bar.

It must have been a week since Angie had left. The days seemed to melt together into weeks – and it must have only been a week, Faye mused, wondering why time had the ability to fly past her so quickly. Time – that was a funny concept. It seemed to exist independent of the universe as Faye knew it, being in England. Some days felt incredibly long and arduous, whilst others melted into forests and cottage-laden villages that surrounded Swindon. When Angie left, it only seemed to make time warp further.

That morning – that Wednesday morning – started out normally. It was cold, but it had been cold the past few days. The steady stream of customers coming in for tea and news started mid-afternoon. The radio in the pub had become quite useful. That early evening was met with the eventual influx of men in uniform, which Faye had always counted on. She stood behind the bar fixing a couple of gin and tonics and whiskies, with the precision of a surgeon. Her hands delicately, yet quickly turned over bottles of liquor; she poured everything perfectly. Though she was out of limes due to the wartime shortages, she would have fancied garnishing each gin and tonic with a large lime. She remembered little after she prepared that fourth gin and tonic – it had become part of the routine… part of the script… a daily motion that had once been interesting but was now rendered meaningless.

"Meaningless…" she muttered to herself as she slid the drinks over the bar, much to the pleasure of the American men receiving them. "Meaningless," she said again quietly, so that no one else could hear. She had planned on seeing Dick again after she got off of her shift. She wondered if he got into trouble coming to her cottage as frequently as he did; she wondered whether or not he had to make up an excuse. She wondered if he was quite honest – and she wondered if people would believe him if he was honestly told his contemporaries what was going on. When it came to Dick, she wondered a lot of things.

The passion she had felt that Thanksgiving night still ran through her veins, but she knew that it was a dangerous passion which she would never be able to speak of. She knew it was the type of passion that one could not rely on; the type that an older woman would speak of as foolish – or, rather, the type a father would disapprove of. The passions of war – the drama of life and death, the taste of liquor and sex, the stickiness of sweat and tears. Those were things which a lady was meant to keep quiet, Faye reminded herself.

That night had been decent – that was until the runner came. Faye was politely talking to a few servicemen at the bar, innocently flirting in an attempt to make more money. She was taken by surprise, when she was interrupted by a man. She would never forget the man's face for as long as she lived.

"A telegram for you, miss." The runner extended an envelope to her with little interest.

"You're mistaken, Trooper." Faye said as she conducted her business. "I don't receive any correspondence."

"You're Faye Murdoch, are you not?" He inquired, continuing to extend the envelope in her direction. Faye nodded. "Well, a few of the fellas in the mail room said that you work here – and some of them – I think one was a Lieutenant! – told me to bring the letter down here for you." Allan Vest didn't dare tell Faye that it was Richard Winters who had sternly ordered him to deliver the letter to her. Vest knew that he wasn't to disobey Lieutenant Winters – he had that look in his eye which Vest understood only as genuine authority.

Faye craned her head toward Vest and stared down the envelope.

"Very well…" she purred through her cherry red lips, her Oklahoma drawl evident. "Thank you, Trooper." Vest nodded and quickly made his way out of the bar. For some reason, Faye intimidated him.

After the men sitting at the bar went to get tables, Faye found herself staring at the envelope as if it had wronged her. When she was satisfied that not a soul was watching her, she reached across the bar top and picked up the envelope.

It was the cover of a telegram – from New York. "NEW YORK" stood boldly printed on the cover of the letter, only serving to remind Faye of the life she once led. Faye prepared herself a cup of black coffee and sat down on her stool behind the bar. She carefully opened the letter, unused to correspondence ever coming her way. Faye quickly pulled the letter out of the envelope, not knowing what to expect as she began to read.

The telegram was marked as urgent, addressed to her. What she read, however, blew her mind.

"Jim Bellows owner Rising Sun deceased leaves property to Faye Murdoch Swindon England immediate return required New York".

Faye could barely comprehend the choppy language of the telegram. She paused for a moment and read the telegram over, making full sentences in her head. _"Jim Bellows, the owner of the Rising Sun, has passed away. He has left the Rising Sun to Faye Murdoch, currently in Swindon, England. Ms. Murdoch must return to New York City immediately_." Faye ran over the words in her head, unable to accept what she was seeing.

"This is a lie." She said out loud, wetness forming in her eyes. "This is…" She ran through the words in her head once again, trying to make sense of it all. Jim was dead? Jim – the man who had taken her in and looked out for her? The man who had been like a second father to her? Jim – was gone? The tears began to freely fall from Faye's bright blue eyes. She felt a burning sensation on her leg.

"Fuck!" she shouted with a sense of despair, realizing that upon understanding the telegram she had dropped a scalding hot cup of coffee onto the floor, causing the ceramic cup to shatter and the hot fluid to run down her legs. She quickly got down on the floor and sat crunched on her hands and knees, attempting to shovel up the broken pieces of the cup into her hands. She could feel her hands becoming raw, the skin growing broken as she continued to scrape mindlessly at the cracked shards.

"Faye!" Dick shouted, standing above Faye.

After a few moments, Faye looked up from the ground and saw Dick looking down at her.

"What the hell are you doing?!" he exclaimed, unaware of what was going on.

"Jim… Jim Bellows… died." Faye mumbled through her tears. Dick's eyes widened. He reached down to the ground and pulled Faye up into his arms, holding the weight of her small body.

"We're going to get you to your house, okay?" he said nervously, unsure of how to handle the present situation.

"I need to go home…" Faye mumbled into Dick's chest. Faye didn't know to what 'home' meant. It could have been New York City or it could have been a warm bed. It didn't matter.

"I'm taking you home." Dick replied, rubbing her back in an attempt to comfort her. Dick placed Faye onto a chair in the bar for a moment, so that he could properly address the patrons at the pub. "Everybody! The Queen Victoria is closing early tonight!" he said with a sense of authority.

A few of the troopers in the bar turned to question him, but they frowned when they saw that the man who had interrupted their evening out was of a higher rank than they were. One man looked as if he was going to start shouting, but Dick shot him a look that few had ever seen before. He dared the man to test his temper. The man grumbled, along with his friends, and began to file out of the bar. Dick quickly ran behind the bar and got the keys. Turning out the lights, he turned again to Faye and proceeded to walk out of the bar with her in his arms. Dick locked the door, still carrying Faye, and began the short walk to Faye's cottage.

He frowned as he realized that she had probably not been eating as much as she would have liked her to, for she felt so light in his arms. She hugged his strong male form as he continued to carry her. Dick felt strange to bear witness to Faye revealing herself in such a vulnerable moment. He enjoyed the sensation of holding her close to him and shielding her from the world, however. He felt, for the first time, as if this was something he was meant to do.

Faye didn't remember the trek from the pub to her cottage, save for Dick's arms around her body. She would later remember feeling as if Dick's arms were the only things holding her down to Earth, preventing her from evaporating into the anonymity of the night sky.

Thoughts swam through Dick's brain as he unlocked the door to Faye's cottage and carried her up to her room. He wondered what would happen – and then he wondered why he had been so stupid to expect a fling with a bartender from New York would last. 'She was only here because of her impulsive cousin,' he reasoned to himself. He shook his head as he realized that he had no authority in this situation. He could hang onto nothing.

He placed Faye on her bed. He saw her face, stained with mascara and tears – the sight upset him, as he knew not what to do in such a situation.

&&&&

**Two days earlier, New York City.**

The hospital room was quiet – too quiet. To say that one could just the character of a life by the number of visitors one had in the hospital would be to tell a grave lie. The faint sound of the oxygen on which Jim Bellows now relied was the only noise in the room, save for the faint buzzing of the lamp by his bed. A doctor walked into the room and shook his head, knowing that he had no other options.

Nobody came forth that day to tell the doctor to keep Jim Bellows on oxygen. Nobody rushed into that room in the eleventh hour with passion in their heart and a fire in their breast commanding the doctor to stand down. Nobody was there.

And it was on that day, at that moment, when the doctor called for the hospital's Roman Catholic priest. Father O'Connor grimly arrived in the room moments later and began to prepare Jim Bellows for his journey into the realm of Eternal Life.

It was a somber day – it was a quiet day – and it was one of the rare days where the doctor felt as if the heart of New York City had stopped beating. He did not hear the trains or the cars or the bustling pedestrians on the sidewalk below the fifth floor hospital room. He heard no airplanes overhead, cutting through the sky in graceful lines. The sun set into the Earth and it was quiet.

After Father O'Connor was finished, the doctor felt a pang of grief surge through his veins. He silently thanked God that he was not to be a doctor on a battlefield, for he knew that at his age, he could not take any more grief. He had seen the coming and going of men at Verdun and at the Somme in the Great War – he had thought that War was the last war he would ever have to endure. He watched the men come to him with empty looks in their eyes, their souls destroyed by mortars and shells, bullets and bombs. He saw the burns and the blindness, he saw the bandages and the results of poison gas. He wanted to see nothing else.

With those thoughts, Dr. Matthew Jackson took Jim Bellows off of oxygen. Jim died a few moments later, his lungs fading into an eternal rest. Matthew Jackson had intended for Jim to be his final patient before he retired, for he could take his trade no longer. This was not to be, however, as a baby was born – with the help of Matthew Jackson – less than an hour after Jim Bellows died, and moments before Matthew Jackson was to leave the building.

&&&&

**Back in Swindon, England**

Dick sat at Faye's kitchen table the next morning, looking over an old newspaper. He wasn't sure of what to think or what to say. He wasn't sure why the death of Jim Bellows had mattered to him that much. People died, after all. It was a natural part of being alive. Jim Bellows, though, was different. Jim Bellows, Dick recognized, had the ability to pull Faye back to Manhattan, even though he was no longer alive.

Dick, at that very moment, realized that he had no power over Faye. The realization did not upset him; it merely made him feel extremely human. He could not tell her what to do or what to feel. Just as he could not command her to do or think anything, she would never listen to him. He had no power to tell Faye to remain in England and wait for him, and he knew Faye would never give up her own life to satisfy his desire to see her constantly. Part of that warmed his heart, for he never had encountered a woman who was so independent. Dick still felt a sense of sadness, as realized that he was living in a world that he had no control over. He felt like he was an actor on a stage with no control over the script.

"Mornin'." Faye greeted Dick meekly as she walked into the kitchen and began to prepare coffee. Dick could tell that Faye had been thinking too much; he could see it in her eyes.

"Morning, Faye." Dick said, unsure of what else he possibly could say. He watched as Faye pulled two coffee cups off of her shelf. She measured out the ground coffee with the precision of a doctor.

"Black no sugar?" she joked sarcastically, trying to mask her sorrow.

"As per usual." Dick responded. He put down his newspaper and gazed at Faye. A few moments of silence followed. The air between Dick and Faye felt incredibly heavy. After a few more moments, Faye carried two cups of coffee to the table and sat across from Dick. Sliding one of the cups across the table, she wrapped her hands around her cup to warm herself up.

"How long have you known Jim?" Dick asked, unsure of how to enter into this conversation.

"A long time." Faye took a small sip from her coffee. "A very long time. He was the first person I saw when I came to New York. 'Gave me a job when nobody else would. He is… he _was_… a _very_ good man." Faye put down her cup of coffee. "He… he…" Faye tried to string the words together. "He left me the Rising Sun."

Dick's eyes widened and he was unsure of how to react. He had not expected this.

"I'm… I should… I mean to say that… I _need_… to go back to New York." Faye blurted out, her eyes growing wet with emotion. "I don't have a choice." Her Oklahoma drawl was once again coming out in full force. "I'm… going to New York, some way or another… I'm going."

It was a strange sight, seeing Faye rather disheveled at an early hour in the morning. She was wearing no lipstick, her hair was not styled, and her clothes hung limply on her tired form. Dick saw the previous day's mascara smudged underneath Faye's eyes.

Faye shot Dick a pleading look, which Dick struggled to find the meaning behind. Was she daring him to defy her will? Was she asking him to make her stop? Was she telling him that she would stop and stay for no one? Why couldn't Faye be simple, like more dependent women?!

"I'm not going to stop you, Faye." Dick said sternly. There was a heavy sadness in his voice which Faye clearly understood. Dick knew, however, that there was no battle to be fought. He knew that Faye had no reason to be staying in England – not even after Angie left for Italy. "And you and I both know that I have no right to stop you."

"I need to leave tomorrow, Dick. I have to be present when they read the will." Faye said absentmindedly, unaware of how to react in such a situation.

"I understand." Dick added quietly.

The two sat in silence drinking their bitter coffees, as the sun continued to rise over the once-sleepy town of Swindon.

"Richard?" Faye inquired, breaking Dick out of his thoughts. "I'm sorry." Before Dick could protest, she continued to speak. "I should have known. It figures, and all. I'm not really the 'staying' or 'following' type, deep down. I guess… I should have…"

"Told me? I knew that about you the whole time, Faye. I knew that from the moment I met you. And do I regret that? No. I don't." Dick said solidly.

"You need to do me a favor, Richard." Faye said, looking deeply into Dick's eyes. "You need find happiness."

Dick and Faye spent the remainder of the day in Faye's cottage. The night that followed was spent entirely in the confines of Faye's bedroom, tangled in between sheets and limbs and sticky sweat. The night was long and short at the same time, yet no promises were made. The throbbing and nibbling and biting and yearning and thrusting left no room for words – words seemed absolutely useless. Dick and Faye silently agreed in their fluid motions of sex and lust that they would not seek each other out – that this would be the final limit of their relationship – and that they would ask for no more.

That morning, Dick kissed Faye after they both finished their cups of coffee. After a few moments lingering in Faye's cottage, Dick helped Faye bring her suitcases out to the black taxi cab which had just arrived at the house. Faye would have a lot to think about on her trip home.


	9. IX

**Author's Note:** Thank you so much for sticking with my story. After a hiatus from due to some personal issues and a mixture of work and school, I'm baaaack. Please review and let me feel the love!

IX.

_New York City don't mean nothing;_

_It's just a good place when you're running._

Savatage

Faye sat at her kitchen table mulling over a cup of black coffee. It had been four weeks since she had returned from England – four weeks that were spent sorting through Jim's will, collecting old belongings that had been left in storage, and turning her new apartment into an actual home.

The apartment she was now living in sat atop the Rising Sun, bearing witness to the glory of the Upper West Side. Faye had never reckoned that she'd be able to actually afford living in Manhattan – or, in such a part of Manhattan, for that matter – but she paid no heed to those thoughts now. She looked over the apartment which she had finally turned into something that made her feel comfortable. Her small table sat at the middle of the kitchen. She looked to the bedroom and saw the new mattress which she had just managed to purchase with some of the money she had received from Jim's will.

As Faye truly took in the sight that was her new home, she realized that she was, once again, starting over. She resigned herself to making this apartment a place that evoked images of stability and serenity – and, above all, relaxation. Faye realized, as she rose to put away some of her clothes into her closet, that she had never quite had a home that epitomized those values. Something always seemed to be lacking.

She felt an emptiness that she could not pinpoint. It acted as a fountainhead within her very soul, morphing and changing as the days went on. Sometimes it bore down on her with the weight of the world. On other days, it was merely nagging – hidden in the very back of her mind, but always there. She thought of Angie and whether or not she was keeping safe. Faye had just received a letter in the mail from Angie, telling her how things weren't as bad as she had expected. Faye was glad to hear it.

As Faye thought about Angie, she would often begin to ponder the war in Europe. With those thoughts, she almost always began to think about Dick. She had told herself – rather, she had sworn to herself – when she had come back to New York that she would give him up. She would give up her gin and tonic with a lime squeezed over it – she would give up the memory and the taste and the faint laughter. She had decided that she would try her very best to forget him. This dedication to forgetting Dick, however, only served to make her think of him more. It was a vicious cycle.

Faye opened her window and lit a cigarette. She watched the morning unfold beneath her. Taxi cabs had begun to dart around the streets, carrying passengers to destinations. Businessmen could be seen below running down to the subway with a sense of thinly veiled anticipation. It was a new day in New York.

The days passed in a similar fashion for Faye; her morning ritual stayed the same as she continued to run the Rising Sun and live upstairs. Her visitors were infrequent and her friends were few. Faye's life seemed as if it was a constant journey from one point to another, never quite reaching a destination.

x.x.x.

_Meanwhile, in England_.

Dick sat in the pub sipping on a cup of tea while reading the paper. Faye didn't work there anymore – and Dick always felt that he had to remind himself of this. He could almost see her pouring drinks, talking to customers, and doing crossword puzzles… all in his mind, playing like movies on reel within his head. He had wanted to forget her so damned badly. He had wanted to toss her memory away into the trash like he had done so with basic paper garbage – hadn't she wanted that? Hadn't she wanted him to move on?

Dick's tea grew cold as he became further lost in his thoughts. After Faye had left, the servicemen who frequented the pub had reckoned that their Lieutenant Winters would stop going to such an establishment. Some of the men had even placed bets. The men who had bet against Dick, however, lost money – as Dick continued this routine up until everyone was transferred to Upottery for the impending invasion of Europe.

He would close his eyes when he read his paper at the bar and he would think of New York City. When he lay in bed at night, praying for sleep – New York City and the people within it would constantly plague his mind. It became so constant that Dick eventually got used to it, not paying it much mind. It became part of the routine. New York City was a constant vision weighing down on him.

x.x.x.

_May, 1944. New York City._

The man stood in front of Faye with his shirt finally off. Faye could feel the heat radiating off of his body. His suit was casually thrown across the chair in her bedroom, evidence of the urgency felt by both parties. Faye ran her hand across his chest and looked into his dark blue eyes. He was really attractive, she admitted to herself – tall, blond, dark blue eyes… He looked like a Norse god – or at least what she imagined a Norse god to be, if one truly could have existed. His lips covered hers and they kissed again, before falling onto the sheets of her queen sized bed.

_Six hours earlier._

Clarissa Walker stood next to Faye Murdoch in a club that had just opened up in downtown Manhattan. It was already popular and very difficult to get into. With the right outfit and make up – and Faye's cherry red lips, no doubt – the two were able to gain entry into the exclusive spot.

Faye had been reluctant to make friends when she returned to New York. As she realized, however, that she needed to stop living with the mindset that she'd never settle down in one area, she understood that she had truly missed friendship. Clarissa had been a new regular at the Rising Sun who only trusted Faye to make her drinks. After about two weeks of simple conversation and drinks, Clarissa had persuaded Faye to come out with her to spend a night on the town. After much hesitation, Faye obliged.

"You need to let go." Clarissa said as she held a drink in her hand and gazed out over the crowd of people in the club. "Don't let this all pass you by."

"That's easier said than done." Faye mused, nursing her own drink. She had caught the eye of a few men in particular, but she wasn't really interested. She kept comparing each man to a certain paratrooper who had been so tall, handsome, and well built… a certain man who had been so funny, intelligent, and full of wit… a certain man who had made her feel small beside the ocean… And nobody quite seemed to measure up.

"Remember, Faye, you aren't committing to anything here. Got it?" Clarissa took a sip from her drink and continued to eye the crowd. "The blond man in the suit has a thing for you." She nodded in the direction of the man and Faye noticed him. He was handsome – she admitted this – and began to study his features. "Make eye contact and I'm sure he'll be here in no time, trying to talk to you." Faye shot Clarissa a wry look. "Like I said – you're not committing to anything!" Faye shrugged her shoulders and decided to take her friend's advice. She looked at the blond man and made eye contact with him.

_Present time._

Faye continued to kiss the man. He ran his arms down her back and held her close as they both partook in the lustful exchange of emotion and want. Faye could feel the man nibble on her bottom lip. She moaned with pleasure but then stopped suddenly – that feeling – that sense of lust and want and need and fervor – was only associated with one man. No other man had been so intense with such a simple display of lust. Images of Dick Winters popped up into Faye's head before she could stop them. She had wanted to move on – she had pictured Dick with other women, knowing that he probably had moved on – but could not find it in her heart to do so.

She pulled away from the blond man and looked at him with a sense of seriousness.

"I think you should leave now." Faye said quietly, wondering if her voice was even audible. The man looked at her curiously, wondering if she was crazy. He had heard her moan softly moments ago, only to quickly see her torn from pleasure to an easily apparent burst of longing.

"We're not finished…" the man reasoned. He sounded confused, wondering how things could have changed so quickly.

"We are now." Faye looked down at her sheets and then back up at the man. "I'm sorry, but you should leave." Faye's voice cracked slightly and she felt like the world was falling down around her.

"Are you okay?" The man inquired, genuinely worried about the woman next to him.

"I'm fine… It's just… I was looking for somebody else." Faye said with a sense of longing. "And… I'm still looking for him."

With those words, the man rose from her bed and began to dress himself. Faye turned around and stared at her alarm clock as he dressed himself. She waited for him to leave before she locked her door and returned to her bed, crying herself to sleep. It seemed that nothing came easy.

x.x.x.

_Upottery, England. June 5._

"You look like a man who needs a drink," Lewis Nixon commented as he observed his friend sitting outside of the movie tent in Upottery, England.

"Is that what you say to men who think too much?" Dick retorted, stretching his shoulders out.

"That is _precisely_ what I say to men who think too much. Hell, why do you think I drink in the first place? _You _think you think a lot? Try getting married."

"Strange that you'd say that. You never struck me as the marrying type." Dick continued on with the conversation, slightly surprised that his good friend was talking about this topic with him. Dick had never really thought about Lewis Nixon actually being married. The thought was actually rather foreign to him, for Lew neither wore a wedding band on his finger nor spoke about his wife.

"I'm not." Lewis admitted, lighting a cigarette. He offered one to Dick but Dick shook his head. "It took me a while to learn that, too. It doesn't matter, however, in the end."

"Does she know that?" Dick asked, referring to Lew's wife.

"She's probably figured it out. She'll probably try to sue me for everything I'm worth, too." Lew added sarcastically. "And you wonder why the hell I love Vat 69 so god damned much. She's a fine mistress who'll never let me down."

"That is… until she runs out…" Dick added, solemnly. Yes, he acknowledged, he knew that feeling. That feeling that could be applied to a myriad of things, living or nonliving – things which mean so much. That feeling which is novel and incredible and reminds you of the first time you drove on the highway, gunning down the road with the windows rolled down, sailing across forested country and cities with little care. Then, things got different – the world seemed real – and things which seemed so solid, so permanent – revealed themselves. They revealed themselves to be of _this_ world and not of some higher, far off plane. Such was life, Dick realized. Hell, he did think a lot.

"You know, I used to believe that things would just work themselves out in the end. I guess that's partially why I'm sitting outside of a movie tent in England, waiting to jump out over occupied France." Lew took a long drag from his Lucky Strike. Sensing that Lew was onto something, Dick let him continue uninterrupted. "But then I realized, now that I'm here – sitting right here, right now – things don't work themselves out. Not the way you want, at least. You have to go out and get what you want. It's the natural order of life – hell, at least that's what they call it back at Yale or some other school yard bullshit, if you catch my drift. You have to go out and claim what you want and never question it."

"Is there some regret I sense in your voice?" Dick asked Lew, after they shared a brief moment of silence.

"Is there some regret that I sense in _yours_?" Lew snapped back. Dick shrugged his shoulders and realized that things would not be as easy as he had hoped they would be.

Faye was thousands of miles away, across the ocean, potentially not even thinking of him – yet she seemed so close and so real to Dick. She seemed so full of life and sarcastically jubilant; he could hear her wry laugh or her bitter comments. He closed his eyes and could see her cherry red lips stand out in a black and white memory. The vision haunted him once again and made him feel insanely small and ridiculously human.

x.x.x.

_June 7, 1944_.

Faye woke up early in the morning and went through her typical morning routine. She had her coffee at her kitchen table, smoked a Lucky Strike out of her window, and then headed down to the newspaper stand across from the Rising Sun to collect the morning paper. As she made her way down the street to the newspaper stand, she saw a throng of people surrounding the newsboy. The only other time Faye had seen a crowd so large had been after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Sensing that something important and potentially devastating had happened, Faye's casual walk to the newspaper stand turned into a frantic run to find out what had happened.

Faye pushed through the crowd of people, not caring who she offended. As she broke through the sea of bodies, she began to scan the newspaper headlines.

"SUCCESSFUL ALLIED INVASION OF FRANCE" was the most prominent headline. Faye's jaw dropped and she looked at the newspapers with a sense of shock. The chatter around her grew louder and louder as the crowd continued to grow.

"Newsboy! I need that paper!" Faye shouted immediately, throwing her change toward the counter of the newsstand. "Hell, I'll take the _Times_, the _Post_, and the _Sun_!" Faye threw down the rest of her change that she had intended to use to buy a fresh box of Lucky Strikes. The boy heard her voice and recognized it as one belonging to one of his most regular customers. He quickly scrambled together a pile of the papers and shoved them quickly into Faye's direction, shooting her a quick smile as a means of expressing gratitude for making a more excessive purchase. Faye nodded quickly and grabbed the papers. She made her way back through the throng of people, pushing and shoving her way through as she needed. After she broke out of the crowd she ran all the way back to the Rising Sun and rushed to sit at the bar.

She pulled the _Times_ in front of her and began to scan the front page. She looked for names of regiments and units that stood out. Before she could make it to the bottom of the page, she saw the word "paratrooper" stuck out as if it had been printed in extra bold font. Faye choked on tears that couldn't slip from her face. Dick had been involved in the invasion. As she continued looking at facts that had just been reported, it had been incredibly evident that it had been a difficult ordeal. Faye shoved the papers aside and exited the bar, locking the door behind her.

The Rising Sun would be closed on June 7 for personal business.

x.x.x.

To Be Continued!


	10. X

**Author's Note:** Thank you very much for reading my story. I also would love to thank those who reviewed my story – it meant a lot to randomly receive a bunch of reviews at random times. It kept me thinking about this story. **Again, I appreciate your reviews, as they definitely motivate my muse. Just sayin'.**

**X.**

Not a breath of air stirred over the free and open prairie; the clouds were like light piles of cotton; and where the blue sky was visible, it wore a hazy and languid aspect.

_Francis Parkman_

The small schoolhouse in Kemp, Oklahoma sat on a lonely plot of land in the middle of a road that connected the eastern part of town with the western part of town. This divide between east and west mattered little to those merely passing through on their way out of the Oklahoma dust, as they knew nothing about the history of the land or its people. They were just travelers, easy come and easy go. Kemp Road extended for miles in either direction, even coming close to piercing the Oklahoma and Texas borders.

The kids who lived on the eastern part of Kemp would spread rumors about the "Injun" upbringing of the children on the west side. Faye remembered the shock she felt when she was five years old, meeting a girl from the western side of Kemp for the first time. She had imagined her to be a little Choctaw girl with black flowing braids and war paint. Much to her childish chagrin, she was paler and fairer than Faye and her eyes were bright blue. At age five, Faye learned to take all language spoken by the neighborhood kids with a grain of salt.

The neighborhood kids grew into neighborhood teenagers and some of them grew into neighborhood adults, but their language remained the same: it was largely meaningless.

'Another year'. 'Two more years'. 'Any day now'. 'Five more minutes'. 'A stitch in time'. Faye remembered hearing all of these phrases ad nauseum. "Another god damned year until I leave this town and head out west to California," she would remember hearing the boy down the road sigh out load as he heaved his family's corn crops into the back of his blue Ford pickup truck to sell down at the market.

Another god damned year.

Faye morosely chuckled to herself as she watched two of her most recently hired employees tend the bar at the Rising Sun. The young adults that came in and out of the Rising Sun looking for work reminded Faye of the travelers and migrants that she recalled seeing during the darkest days of the Depression, heading west down Kemp Road and praying for God to help them get the hell out of Oklahoma. They never stayed in one place for too long, and they always asked for too much.

Faye fired a lot of the kids quickly. They were kids in her eyes.

"Another god damned year." Faye said aloud this time, smoking a cigarette outside of the Rising Sun and turning her attention to the traffic that was rushing by her. The traffic had progressed much like the past year – 1945 had come at Faye like a ton of bricks with little regard for anything or anybody in its path.

The street had been busy – but not as busy as the day that the war in Europe had ended. That day was one Faye would never and could never forget. Marching bands lined the streets playing patriotic anthems and people danced and kissed in the middle of Broadway with confetti falling from above them with a sense of abandon. The world seemed lighter – as if things were no longer dismal or desperate. Cherries and beer and chocolate tasted better and more satisfying on that day. People smiled and showed their teeth – they had kept that joy restrained for so very long.

But then again, the war was not over. As Faye recalled the unrestrained pleasure of the past two months, her thoughts drifted toward the war in the Pacific. It was August 1st of 1945 and the war against Japan was still raging. Faye wondered where her brother was at this point in time – her mother never wrote her and she sure as hell realized that her brother never had her address to begin with. Faye was desperate to get out of Oklahoma and she had resigned herself to do so at any cost.

With that in mind, Faye realized when it came to family, she had been a failure. Robert was god knows where – hell, she had no idea if he was even still alive. They had never been close to begin with, but Faye knew that she was only kidding herself. She wondered if her mother had been lonely over the past few years and wondered if she still kept her shotgun and her Bible in the same drawer. She gazed out over the Manhattan street scene and wondered if the ranch back in Oklahoma looked any different.

The ranch, however, didn't matter now. Faye took another drag from her Lucky Strike and blew out the smoke nonchalantly. All of her life, Faye felt as if she had a piece of the ranch deep within her soul. In every person, she reckoned, there was a place that was their own – their home within themselves, their secret place that nobody else can access. Within Faye hid the ranch and the sprawling farmland covered with wheat. The bright orange and yellow sun beat down on the land with a sense of heavenly purpose; the sky was always blue and it only rained when it was absolutely necessary. The soil never went hungry. And in that space, that sacred space, everything was calm and everything was as it should be.

The wheat danced with the prairie wind and sometimes there were horses running freely across the land, undomesticated and pure. When Faye retreated to this hidden place, she felt most alive. It was hard to keep that place hidden from the constant weight of the world, which sought only to crush and destroy the hidden prairie. Faye did her best.

By August of 1945, Faye's secret space within her soul had remained intact. Throughout her life, she had built up the prairie within her… and in that place, Faye had stored things and people of importance. They remained within her, unchanged by time.

In her sacred space, Dick Winters sat at a table in her ranch house sipping on sweet tea and reading the paper. This was how she imagined him to be, with his skin tanned from working in the fields and his muscular body stretched out on a wicker chair. Unbeknownst to herself, Faye had placed Dick in that ranch house the moment she had met him in 1943 in New York City. By the dog days of 1945's summer, he remained there, unchanged by time and stoic as ever.

The loud beeping of car horns dragged Faye back into the metropolitan reality of the world around her. She pulled herself out of her prairie and continued to look out over the cityscape that had once again sprung up around her body. Dick Winters fell back into Faye's prairie, hidden from the world – a part of her that nobody else could see.

Faye sighed as the cars around the Rising Sun continued to honk at a minor traffic accident that had occurred farther on down the road. Having gotten as much out of her cigarette break as possible, she returned into the Rising Sun and continued to go about her day of business.

x.x.x.

Bull Randleman swung at the baseball with all of his might. He had always been a strong man: a working man. He had always been used to carrying more weight than others could bear and hauling objects that men were not intended to haul. The farmstead back in Arkansas had trained him well. The five years spent with his Company – his family – had trained him in a different way, however. He had a different type of strength… the strength to carry what no man should ever carry – but the fortitude to find some sacred piece of joy in every aspect of labor. The ball met his rough hewn bat as if God had set it on that very course. Before Bull could ascertain the trajectory of the ball, he ran. He ran with all of his strength and endurance and was determined to make it back past home plate.

Jimmy Martin and George Luz had worried that with two outs and the bases nearly loaded that they'd finish out the inning scoreless. They hated the sensation of losing. Maybe it had been the lack of money back home in 1940, or maybe it had been that dgodless winter spent in the Ardennes Forrest staring down the barrel of a gun… they hated losing above all. They could accept the death and the madness, if only their cause would win in the end. Baseball, of course, simplified such matters – however they still ran around the baseball diamond as if they were born for that very task.

Martin, Luz, and Randleman crossed home plate one after the other. Their team cheered triumphantly in the dugout, realizing that they now had a shot at winning the game. After seven innings of pure torture, things were finally beginning to look up.

"Reminds me of the war." Lewis Nixon said as he ran a hand through his hair. He sat on the make shift bleachers next to Dick Winters. Dick had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He sat, leaning with one elbow on his knee watching the game unfold below him.

"The fact that Randleman's team almost lost?" Dick smirked a bit as he looked at Lewis.

"After losing for so long, it's good to win." Lewis said morosely, perhaps making a statement about his own life. Dick pondered Lew's words and looked out across the baseball field. The two sat in silence. Lewis pulled out a Lucky Strike and smoked with a sense of deep contemplation.

x.x.x.

The loud ring of the telephone cut through the silence of Faye's kitchen. Faye sighed as she looked at the old clock that Jim Bellows had once kept in his office. It was 10:07 PM – rather late for a phone call on a Sunday night. Faye slowly rose and decided to take the call.

"I'm calling for a Miss Faye Murdoch." Faye's eyes widened as she recognized the voice on the other end of the call. She hadn't heard it in so long. The Oklahoma drawl was not lost – Robert Murdoch's voice danced like the wind sweeping over the prairies that he had left so long ago.

"Robert?" Faye answered after a few seconds of shocked silence.

"You're harder to get a hold of than Truman, kid." He said with the sense of humor that Faye had remembered as distinctly his.

"You could say that." Faye chuckled. She reached for her box of Lucky Strikes that she had near the phone and brought a slim cigarette up to her lips.

"I just… I wanted to let you know that I'm in town." Robert paused for a moment, unsure of how to talk to a sister that he hadn't spoken with in over five years. "How does tomorrow strike you?"

Faye took a drag from her cigarette and smiled into the phone receiver.

"Tomorrow sounds lovely." Faye smirked as an idea popped into her head. "How about we meet at this bar I've heard a lot about lately? It's called the Rising Sun. It's on West 84th Street. Say… six PM?"

"That sounds great, Faye." Robert sighed, which Faye heard through the phone. "I just… I don't feel very good about not seeing you for so long… and for not keeping in touch. It's…"

"It's fine. Life happens." Faye smiled softly now with a sense of regret. "There's always time to make things better."

"You were always the smart one, you know that?" Robert added.

"Of course." Faye giggled quietly.

"So, six PM at this Rising Sun joint?"

"Six PM it is. Goodnight, Robert." Faye said with a sense of sleepy conviction.

"Sleep well. See you tomorrow."

Faye hung up the phone and looked out her kitchen window onto the street below her. It baffled her that just across the East River was her brother. Robert had seemed so far away and so distant… and he still seemed as such. The lack of distance between them now only amplified Faye's feeling that she barely knew her brother to begin with.

Faye finished her cigarette and quickly tidied up her kitchen. After a tired yawn, Faye turned off the lights and headed into her bedroom to go to sleep.

x.x.x.

The sun beat down on Eugene Roe as he took a swing at the well worn baseball that had been hurled toward him. Unbeknownst to the pitcher, Roe had played a significant amount of baseball back in Louisiana. He flashed the pitcher a boyish grin – one that many had never seen before – and began to race down the first base line.

As he ran with all of his might, he finally crossed home plate. Satisfied with his home run, he flashed a wild grin of contentment.

"Never thought the best ball you'd play would be in Nazi Germany, did ya?" George Luz shouted out, causing many to roar with laughter.

The laughter died down, however, as the men saw Ronald Speirs in his uniform standing next to a formally dressed Lewis Nixon and Richard Winters. The words that fell out of Winters' lips were strange and foreign – and nobody had ever expected that they would be uttered. After seeing the carnage of June 6 and experiencing winter in Bastogne, none of it seemed real.

The war was over. A few men cried with tears they didn't know they had. Others kicked the dirt with a sense of disdain – this was how their glory days had been spent, they reasoned – fighting a brutal enemy, digging fox holes, and seeing friends and comrades die. This was how those years were spent – cold, hungry, and worn down to the bone.

As Lewis Nixon saw the reactions of the men, he turned to Dick Winters.

"So, I'll finally make a New Jersey resident out of you." He said with a sense of triumphant sarcasm. "If I can recall correctly, it is particularly lovely during this part of year."

"Did you rehearse that?" Dick eyed Lew with serious eyes. After the two stared each other down, they broke into laughter. After moments lost in sheer joy and happiness, the two sat down on the bleachers and looked out over the men that they had come to know so well.

"I'm leaving for the States as soon as I can, Dick." Lew said with a serious voice. "I have a few affairs that I have to tend to. I've been away for too long." Dick understood what Lew meant by this – his divorce.

"Do you think it will be different?" Dick asked randomly, unsure of whether or not he was ready for the answer.

"Some things will be different beyond recognition… Other things will stay the same. That's the way it is – that's the way it will always be."

x.x.x.

Faye stood outside of the Rising Sun wearing a brand new pastel yellow dress that she had just purchased at Macy's. Her lips were bright red, as per usual. Her shoes were freshly polished and matched her dress, in keeping with popular fashion. She looked like a city girl, through and through.

She eyed a yellow cab as it pulled up to the curb. She stood confidently and watched the passenger get out. Faye's eyes widened as she saw her brother Robert in a fine suit, even wearing a hat. His hair was dark brown and his skin was deeply tanned. His eyes were bright blue and stood out like gem stones against his tanned and angled face.

"If that isn't a vision in yellow, I don't know what I'm seeing before my eyes." Robert said with a thick Oklahoma drawl after he closed the taxi's door. Faye's eyes widened as she took in the sight of her brother – he seemed so different than when she had last seen him. He was taller and much more muscular. He had just turned 18 when the war broke out – and he was 24 now.

When Robert Murdoch had joined the service at the age of 18, it was 1939. War in Europe had just broken out. Prior to America's involvement in 1941, he spent two years in Tennessee perfecting his sharp shooting and running faster than he ever imagined he could. By the time he got to Europe in 1941, he was ready to see the world. By the time most of his American comrades had joined in him in 1944, he was an old timer – he had been there and done that. He was the one the replacements looked up to with a sense of reverence.

Of course, this meant nothing in New York City. It was as if no time had passed at all – and Robert Murdoch was simply a handsome, tall and muscular man with a distinctly foreign yet familiar accent. Everything was different for Faye, however. Nothing seemed familiar.

"You're…" Faye barely eked out, as Robert came close to her.

"I could stutter the same about yourself." Robert answered back smartly. Faye chuckled. She closed the gap between herself and Robert and brought him into a long embrace. "It's been far too long, Faye." Faye could feel unshed tears glisten over her eyes. Before she allowed herself to be too emotional in public, she pulled away from Robert and smiled.

"I wanted you to see my bar." She said slyly.

"_Your_ bar?" Robert cocked up an eyebrow and looked at the building that stood behind Faye.

"My bar." Faye said with a sense of satisfaction. "The Rising Sun. I own it."

"Your… bar… My little sister… owns a bar?" Robert blurted out, soon regretting his words. Faye raised an eyebrow in his direction and the smile fell from her face.

"Robert, brothers who don't see their _baby_ sisters in over six years – you know, with no correspondence and all – don't really get the right to complain about their _baby_ sister's life choices." Faye realized that she may have sounded overly critical. Robert sighed.

"I didn't mean it like that… I was just… surprised." Robert looked into Faye's eyes. Their blue orbs shone brightly in an identically vibrant shade. "You've just done a lot for yourself in six years. That's more than most people do in a lifetime."

"I feel like I've lived multiple lifetimes, if that helps any…" Faye added.

"I feel the same." Robert smiled. "And now, how about you invite me into The Rising Sun and make me an Old Fashioned?"

"You bet your bottom dollar." Faye chuckled and the two walked through the doors of the Rising Sun.

"I expect no less." As the Robert sat down at the bar and Faye began to take out the rocks glass she needed for the Old Fashioned, Faye realized that she needed to take care of the things she cared for. Images of past memories and people popped up into her mind. As she began to get lost in thought while performing the repetitive task of making Robert's drink, her mind drifted off to Dick Winters. She wondered whether or not he was back in the United States now that the war was officially over. She wondered if he was in Pennsylvania or in Germany or with another woman who she really couldn't think about.

"You're a quick pour, Faye." Robert remarked, bringing Faye out of her musings and back down to Earth. "Mom would be proud."

"You think?" Faye asked because she felt she was supposed to. "And how is she doing?"

"I don't know." Robert said quietly. "Nobody knows. That's one of the things I wanted to talk about with you."

"I'll pour myself a gin and tonic. Pull out the stool next to you." With those words, Faye slid Robert's Old Fashioned across the bar top and began to prepare her own drink.

x.x.x.

The jet engines of the airplane roared. It was a strange sensation for Dick, as this was his second plane ride as a civilian. His first had only occurred hours ago – the flight from Germany to London. He sat next to Lewis Nixon in the first class section of a plane heading from the Heathrow Airport in London to Newark International Airport in New Jersey. The sensation of being waited on was strange to Dick. After all, it had not been all that long ago that he was jumping out of airplanes.

When Richard's body flew through the sky, plummeting from a military airplane, he felt no pain. He would get the same nauseating sensation in the pits of his stomach prior to jumping – yet it all would disappear as soon as the cold wind hit his face and tore through his dark hair. He became aware of everything. He felt as if he could see the curve of the Earth, but he knew it was not so; it did not matter. Nothing mattered except for the cold comforts of gravity and his parachute.

The engines were much quieter on this plane, though. There was a door on the airplane that had been solidly locked right before his eyes. He had imagined the whole ordeal to be louder. In fact, he found it surprising that the sound of the engines had begun to call him to the silent world of sleep. It had been a strange experience indeed.

Lewis Nixon sat across the aisle from Dick smoking a Nicaraguan cigar and holding a glass of the most expensive whiskey he could find. He lounged out in a fine suit and had the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times spread out in an organized fashion on the tray in front of him. The market was good, he read. The market was good. He smiled as he thought of the possibilities concerning Nixon Nitration Works. Dick would be a very good business partner, he reasoned. After all, you could trust a man who kept a clean shave during an artillery barrage in the Ardennes Forest. Men like that were of a dying breed and they were hard to come by. Men like that knew how to keep things in order and run things efficiently. Men such as that were leaders.

And with those thoughts swimming through his fast paced mind, Lewis turned over to his friend. He could see that Dick was finally relaxing. His eyelids were being slowly pulled shut by both the lull of the engines and the fatigue that he hid so well.

Lewis knew that Dick still thought of her – Faye – and that bar back in New York City. He had resigned himself to be a silent onlooker, as nothing he seemed to do as of late proved to be fruitful. He had tried to set Dick up with a variety of women – Germans, Brits, and Americans… yet everything fell apart. Sometimes he knew that the women would spend the night in Dick's quarters. Those dark transactions that occurred hidden behind the weight of linen sheets and closed doors always left Dick and the women empty. Nothing seemed to work. Faye, Lewis reasoned, was an enigma that he would leave Dick to figure out himself. His mother always told him that you don't rush greatness. Dick Winters, to Lewis Nixon, was greatness.

As he put down his nearly empty glass of whiskey, a tired but pleasant steward came to retrieve the empty glass. Lewis Nixon put the dying end of his cigar in an ashtray and took off his shoes. Reclining his chair and kicking up his feet on an ottoman, he prepared himself for the world of sleep. He watched through the window as the sky faded into a dark, deep blue that rivaled only the shade of black.

x.x.x.

The rain dripped down the windows of Faye's apartment. It had been two weeks since Robert left New York. She had paid for his taxi cab to the airport so that he could catch a red eye flight to Oklahoma City. A car would be waiting for him in Oklahoma to take him down the incredibly long and winding Kemp Road.

Marlene Murdoch had died in 1943. Faye wondered whether the universe weighed less because Marlene had been gone for two years. After crying in Robert's arms for what felt like hours, Faye reasoned that the universe did indeed weigh less. It was only natural. It made sense.

A wise man once said in Holland, "If there ain't no body, there ain't nobody dead". Faye had never heard such words, but they would have helped her as she sat at her kitchen table watching the rain pitter and patter down her windows. Marlene Murdoch had disappeared in 1942. In 1943, she had been assumed dead, with no evidence to prove such a statement.

There was no funeral, because there was no body. And even if there had been a funeral, there probably would have been_ nobody_. For some, it was a relief that Marlene Murdoch was no longer around with her shotgun, her misplaced Bible, and her collection of spirits. The preacher didn't like her, not one bit… and the woman the next farm over sure as hell wanted nothing to do with her deviant ass.

And Faye realized, at that point in time, as the rain continued to slide down her windows, that she had taken Robert's word to be true – and Robert had taken a preacher man's word to be true, without any evidence. _"The preacher never has any evidence, not about nothing, baby"_. The words played through Faye's head until she realized that her mother had said that many a time.

Days later, Robert placed a long distance phone call to New York City. When Faye picked up the call, she didn't know what to expect. Apparently, Marlene had left a will next to her Bible and her shotgun. The farm went even to Robert and Faye. Two days after the phone call, the Murdoch Farm was put up for auction and the acres on which Faye had grown up were sold to an oil man from East Texas.

Faye sighed when she heard the news. She had walked away richer from the auction… but unaware of how to feel about it all. The only thing that mattered, however, was that the prairie land had already been placed inside of her, in her sacred space. No oil man from Texas could buy it and nobody could rip apart the porch or the wooden rocking chairs. Nobody would drag Dick Winters in his masculine glory from that kitchen table – nobody would pull him away from his cup of sweet tea and his newspaper. That prairie, that place within Faye – that was sacred.

x.x.x.

**Thanks! To be continued! I think there are about two more chapters in the works!**


	11. XI

**Author's Note:** After a two month hiatus from and all sorts of writing, I'm back. Thanks for keeping up with this story.

And, of course, if you love this story enough to mark it down as your favorite or to add it to your story alerts, don't be shy! Leave a review and let me know what you think. It keeps me going… I promise.

XI.

"You were born with wings. Why crawl through life?" - Rumi

**December, 1946.**

The small church stood on the edge of Nixon, New Jersey and the bordering town. A fresh snow had blanketed the cold pavement. A late parishioner opened the heavy doors to the church desperate to get in quickly. The whistling of the winter wind blew into the church along with remnants of the dusty white powder. Richard Winters shivered as the cold air made its way down the aisle, eventually reaching his pew.

"How nice of you to join us, Mr. Mahler." The preacher said loudly with a warm smile on his face. The congregation laughed whilst Andrew Mahler hastily found a seat in the back of the church. "As I was saying, my prayers as of late are directed toward the hearts and souls of Americans. Thou the depression and the violence of war have moved past us, we must not forget that there are those among us constantly facing a struggle. I digress, my parish – today we must speak of Christ's love. That is our message."

Richard watched the preacher with a sense of calm. This was the first time he had gone to church since he had been in Europe before the war ended. When he went to Toccoa, he had firmly believed that he would remain a faithful Christian. He thought that nothing would change or test that faith. Sitting in the pew in that small church on that blustery winter morning, however, Dick wondered why he had decided to attend the service. He had seen the preacher eye him with a sense of curiosity – he got that a lot.

_He served in the war_. That's what it had all come down to – that look of curiosity that he was always met with was always indicative of that very thought. It was a simple observation that could be seen in the way Richard carried himself. He rarely slouched, he was always punctual, and he was a man of action. His face was finely chiseled, evidence of some planned creation that so many others had not been privy to. He was a foreigner wherever he went.

"I read today from First Corinthians, perhaps one of the better loved excerpts of scripture – and for a good reason. Please turn to First Corinthians." The warm words of the preacher were met with a bunch of parishioners quickly flipping to open their Bibles – most of the parishioners brought Bibles with them to the church. Dick didn't have a Bible, so he instinctively reached toward the back of the pew in front of him and began to finger through the well-worn book. It had been a long time since he had done this.

"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child:" began the preacher. Dick couldn't concentrate on the book in his hands. He immediately thought of his life – his life before the horror of war. "But when I became a man, I put away childish things." He thought of the bullet that he had fired – the bullet that had killed the boy soldier in the Waffen SS uniform. _Please. Don't shoot_. The begging never ceased.

"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." Another parishioner rushed into the church, opening the heavy doors and letting in another gust of winter wind. The wind, in conjunction with the words, caused Dick to shiver. He could hear the sound of mortar fire and the splintering of trees. He could hear screams and he could see the white, pure forest floor tainted with the blood of his comrades – comrades he had taken an oath to protect. Dick wondered if it was in the middle of the Ardennes Forrest that he had stopped believing in God.

The preacher cleared his throat and continued. "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity." He closed his Bible to signify that he was finished with reading scripture. "And what is implied by charity but _love_?"

Dick had known his particular verse. He had known it well. He had remembered hearing his grandmother read it to him as a child; he could hear her strong tone of voice in his head. He recalled hearing this same verse at a church in France during the war – and he remembered wondering, for the first time in his life, what it truly meant. Charity seemed nonexistent then.

The walls of the church were humble and decorated with no stained glass windows. Though the walls were unimposing, he could feel them closing in on him. The parishioners around him seemed to no longer exist; he couldn't tell the difference between pastel dresses or dark grey suits. Everything seemed to be swirling within his head while he attempted to remain firm. He had hoped – hell, he had almost prayed – that nobody had noticed what was happening to him.

Dick felt as if he was evolving, in some strange sort of way. His body felt constricted and he felt as if he had gone into hiding – as if the real him had retreated into some shell – some room that he hid within itself. He wondered how long he would be able to hide himself in this room before the silence became too much to bear. The voice of the preacher continued to sweep over the church in waves of grace and contemplation. The warm male voice swam through Dick's head, but he could no longer make out any of the words that the preacher was saying.

He could hear nothing. When the congregation rose to sing a hymn praising the glory of God, Dick rose like a blind soldier. He gazed forward, over the crowd, and onto the very altar of the church. The preacher observed Dick – a man whom he had never seen before. _Yes, most definitely, yes, yes, a soldier. _The preacher prayed silently for the soldier as the congregation continued to sing.

Dick didn't know how long the service had gone on for. It hadn't really mattered. He just remembered the haunting words of the scripture that the preacher had recited – and he remembered what those very words had meant to him throughout the various stages of his life. Things were different now.

What had the sermon's topic been? Dick wondered. Love – ah, yes – _God's_ love. The last few words he remembered the preacher saying had been '_And what is implied by charity but love?' _Had Dick been a stranger to charity his entire life? Did charity have to be godly?

As he walked from the church down the snowy pavement to his motorcar, he played over these questions in his head. Charity, to him, was the way Faye Murdoch had squeezed a fresh lime over a drink in her apartment while seducing him. The way in which she squired below him when he was on top of her – that was charity.

There was charity in the moans and sighs he witnessed escaping from her cherry red lips. And what was implied by charity… but love?

Dick paused as he pulled his keys out of the pocket of his black wool coat. _Love_.

Was that what he had felt for Faye? Was that why he couldn't quite replace her with anybody else? Was that why the women who had thrown themselves at him did nothing but bore him and annoy him?

What was _love?_

x.x.x.

Faye ran down Broadway with a sense of purpose. The wind blustered through her long tresses and beat down against her wool coat. She had been glad she was wearing thick stockings that day, for it had been one of the coldest December days to date. She ran past newsboys ringing bells, desperately hoping that passersby would be interested enough to give them their pocket change. The news headlines had all been the same, though – many of them spoke about the newfound prosperity at home, all the while coal shortages raged through Europe.

Faye wondered, briefly, how the people she had encountered in Swindon were faring given the coal shortages. She knew it had been a cold winter – and she had known all too well from her humble upbringing that having few resources during the winter was the worst. She shook off her thoughts and continued to run quickly down the streets.

She had preferred to walk throughout the city, regardless of the weather. The constant movement of the cars and people made her feel alive and unstoppable. There was something in the way in which everybody seemed as if they were on a special mission that made her smirk. Every man and woman she past by was in the middle of his or her own private battle – and that was their charge, their task, and their mission. Everybody had something. Everybody moved quickly.

The bitter cold wind had begun to wear Faye down, however, and she capitulated. Slightly annoyed that she would not be walking, she raised her right arm with a sense of fortitude and stepped out onto the street. Seconds later, a bright yellow taxi cab pulled up before her and she let herself into the back seat.

The ride to her apartment was quiet, as the windows of the cab were shut tightly to prevent the cold air from breaking into the vehicle. The taxi driver attempted to make small talk, but Faye was having none of it. She was lost in thought. Bright lights faded past her as the cab driver wove in and out of traffic and she tried to make out the different faces that she saw. Everybody was here, she decided. Everybody was in New York.

As the driver pulled the car up to the curb, Faye quickly pulled the fare out of her purse and gave it to the driver.

"Have a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year, miss." The driver said, feeling as if the woman in his cab barely cared.

Faye sighed as she stepped out the cab and entered her apartment building. As she carried herself up the stairs, she pondered the man's words. In a relatively small amount of years, Faye felt as if she had lived multiple lifetimes. The idea that another year would be passing by her made her feel strangely mortal – she realized, as she was walking up the stairs to her apartment, that she would die one day. She would die like Jim Bellows – she would die, maybe even alone.

1946 had come and gone like a brazen red street car cutting through a wet road in the middle of the night. The streetlamps and the faint yellow glow from apartment buildings high above the pavement reflected off of the derelict street; the red street car stopped for no one. The speed of the car – its vivacity – ran in conjunction with the loneliness and desolation of the beat up street. A fresh snow would fall soon. The car would melt into a new horizon, ushering in 1947.

Less than ten years ago, she had been beating a carpet clean over a front porch in Oklahoma. She remembered the distinct smell of the wind blowing over the vast expanse of prairieland. Only five years ago, she had been cutting her way through the harsh reality of the city, paving a way for herself. Two years ago, she had been on an island nation – part of a different continent, across an endless ocean – trying to start again. The two years that she had been back in New York City after leaving England had been the most trying. For the first time in her life, Faye felt as if every move she made was permanent. She felt as if life mattered now – as if she was no longer an actress, but a soul privy to the real thing.

She pulled out a Lucky Strike from the lonely box on her countertop and struck a match. The sweet smell of nicotine comforted Faye as she looked through her window over the street that she had just escaped from.

"Happy fucking New Year," she said aloud to herself, as if she was speaking to God. She had always secretly hoped that life had a knack for balancing itself out – that if a few random things happened that tilted the scales in one direction, other things would happen to tilt the scales in the opposite direction, ergo creating a sense of equilibrium. 1947, she reasoned, had to be better 1946 if only on principle. She tapped a few ashes off of her cigarette on an ashtray and continued to gaze over the street scene below her. There were a few luxuries she missed – a few hidden mercies and amens and hidden Hail Mary's that she always kept to herself but knew were there, waiting in the darkness.

"Richard." Faye said resolutely, continuing to look out of the window. "God damn it!" she muttered loudly, kicking against the cabinet under her kitchen sink. She had no idea where the hell he was, but she knew where he wasn't. He wasn't dead – she would have read about it in the paper. She would have found out. She had always read the paper and kept apprised of the news solely for that purpose. The war could have been lost, but hell, as long as Richard was alive, it would have been okay.

Richard, she realized, was a grown man. Had he wanted to seek her out, he would have done so. Maybe he did. Maybe he was waiting for the right time. Maybe, she reasoned, that 1947 would be the year – of course, because 1946 sure as hell wasn't. She would give him one more year, she decided. She had never quite stuck to New Year's resolutions, but she decided in her emotional frailty over her kitchen sink with a cigarette dangling from her fingers, that she would do something – she would follow through.

1947, she decided, was the year. If he didn't contact her in 1947, she would give him up. She would put away the gin and tonic – she would give up childish things – and she would move on. A year, and that was that – 365 days – no more, no less. She would give Richard Winters exactly one year to seek her out. After all, he was a grown man. He had time to figure out what he wanted and did not want. After that year, if she never saw him again, she would give him up and move on.

A year was all she needed.


	12. XII

**Author's Note**: THIS IS THE CHAPTER WHERE EVERYTHING COMES FULL CIRCLE! Thank you so much for sticking around with my story – and I hope that you'll review and let me know what you think!

Author's Note 2: You are all more than welcome to check out my blog: http:/coffeeandcircuses (dot) wordpress (dot) com.

**XII.**

"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field.

I will meet you there."

- Rumi

**March, 1947.**

The Hudson River caressed the West Side of Manhattan, beating up against the piers with its dark and murky water. New Jersey was clearly visible in the distance: the derelict lights of buildings across the inky water illuminated a shore that felt as if it was so close… yet so far away. Nixon, New Jersey was an hour southwest of the grandest city on Earth – and Faye Murdoch felt as if it was on a distant planet.

Whenever she walked through Riverside Park, Faye Murdoch thought of Lewis Nixon. She had once asked a taxi driver who had been sitting at her bar how long it would take him to get to Nixon, New Jersey. He told her that he could get her there – if there was no traffic – in less than fifty minutes.

So that's what it was – fifty minutes. Fifty minutes stood between Faye Murdoch and Lewis Nixon. She had been sure that he would be there after he returned home from the war. She had seen his name grace the pages of the New Yorker's Society Page – and she smiled inwardly, knowing that he must have cringed at the thought of his name appearing in such a magazine.

If such a distance could be closed in fifty minutes, Faye often wondered why it was taking years. She had decided, though, in keeping with her New Year's Resolution that she would not act. She would wait. She would wait as she had been waiting since she returned to the City of Life. She would stay on the Upper West Side and wait one more year.

Life, she reasoned, had to go on as it always did. She had to continue earning her living – and she sure as hell didn't want to have to tell her brother Robert that she followed some random pipe dream that led nowhere. She had been independent of her brother and anybody's influence – hell, she had desperately tried to avoid the influence of any man – but she rued the thought of telling Robert that she had run off to find a man.

Running off to find a man, Faye decided, was just about as worse as being dependent on a man. She wondered, sometimes, if she was being hypocritical. Was she dependent on the lingering memory of Richard? She wanted to say she wasn't, even if deep down, she was.

Richard Winters had one year to change things.

**May, 1947.**

The small diner sat on the outer-limits of Nixon, New Jersey. On a bad day, all you could hear was the rumbling of Interstate 95 cutting through the town and polluting the air with noise. On a good day, if you listened closely, you could hear the birds and the ever-constant sound of the industrial complex that brought Nixon, New Jersey to life.

On certain days, Lewis Nixon preferred not to listen at all. Sitting at a booth in the old diner, he was somewhat of an anomaly. He wore a finely tailored suit and read the paper as a waitress passed by and filled his mug with yet another serving of hot coffee. In approximately seven minutes, a platter of eggs, toast, and bacon would be brought out to him. He would finish two cups of coffee before then. It sure as hell was better than the few swigs of Vat 69 that he used to screw around with every morning.

In approximately four minutes, Richard Winters would enter into the diner and sit across from Lewis Nixon. This was their Wednesday morning routine. They would discuss business, life, and the world around them. Sometimes, they wouldn't talk at all. Coffee, however, was always consumed. The waitresses would chat about them and pretend not to stare at them as they sat engrossed in conversation. The two stood out beyond belief: the usual regulars of the diner were truckers, taxi drivers, and random inhabitants of the town that had nothing better to do.

Every Wednesday morning, they drank coffee together and ate the same thing. They had seen each other at their best – and they had witnessed each other at their worst. Richard Winters had seen what happened when a man could no longer take the world around him. He understood that this situation was ten times worse in the middle of a blizzard when mortar fire was heading your way. Richard Winters implicitly understood Lewis Nixon.

There were two topics that were never to be discussed, however: Lewis Nixon's alcoholism and Richard Winter's lost connection with Faye Murdoch. Both issues were easily apparent; both permeated into the everyday existence of each man and wore him down to the bone. One was an addiction while the other was a bitter sense of longing. Both, however, found their roots in loneliness.

As Lewis took a drag from his Lucky Strike, he smirked. Richard had walked into the diner looking particularly tired. He strode over and sat across from Lewis. The waitress would bring out two breakfast dishes in approximately three minutes. Their orders never changed – and everything was always on time.

"May I ask what kept you up all night?" Lew inquired, tapping off cigarette ashes over an ashtray.

"No." Richard unfolded the paper that had been placed at his seat. He took a Lucky Strike out of the box that was already on the table; Lew quickly offered him a light which he held his cigarette over as he inhaled. He removed the cigarette from his lips after a satisfying drag. The waitress came over and brought him a fresh cup of coffee. "Don't' ask me a question when you already know my answer." He didn't scold Lewis, but he shot him a glance that, if anything, was a warning.

"Well, well, aren't we cranky this morning!" Lew replied quickly with knowing eyes. At that moment, they had silently agreed that they would not engage in any conversation that morning. It was one of those mornings.

On that particular Wednesday, the sound of Interstate 95 cut through the edge of town; a constant buzzing from the steady traffic made its way through the glass windows of the diner. Fifty minutes on that highway could get you from Nixon, New Jersey all the way into Manhattan.

When the highway was particularly noisy, Richard thought of Manhattan. She was fifty minutes away – and it killed him.

**August, 1947.**

The newspaper sat on the bar top; it was opened to a random editorial page. A customer in the Rising Sun scanned the paper until he found a piece that he liked.

"Humankind has a unique position within the animal kingdom. A man is above all beasts, yet is still subject to beastly pursuits and passions." The man chuckled a bit and scanned down a few paragraphs, wondering if the author was getting anywhere. "What makes us human? Is it our ability to love? Is it our compassion? Better yet, are we human because we are driven by our passions and our compulsions?" The cab driver scanned again down a few paragraphs. "We are, without a doubt, the most stubborn beings in existence. We could easily stand within five feet of a person we desperately wish to speak to – but we will avoid them if we do not know how to proceed. Better yet, we will avoid what is _best _for us, in order to pursue a road that is most convenient and comfortable."

The man placed the paper down on the bar top and shook his head. He hated the 'pop philosophy' and 'pop psychology' that polluted the papers these days.

"Anything good in that rag, Art?" asked a melodious female voice from behind the bar. The words slipped out from cherry red lips and caused the cab driver to smile.

"Humans, the author says, don't know what's good for 'em and are stubborn as hell." Art shrugged his shoulders and picked up his ale, taking another sip.

"No shit." Faye muttered to herself, as she stretched out her arms and mentally prepared herself for a long night of work ahead of her.

**October, 1947.**

"_I have to leave…" _Dick Winters heard Faye's words play over and over in his head as he stared down at his coffee. He had come to New York because Lewis Nixon told him to take a break and 'go somewhere'. He wondered what Lew meant by that, as he had a scheming look in his eye when he suggested that Dick take a small vacation. Deep down, he sensed that it was finally time – he had to seek out Faye. He had to find her. He reckoned that if anybody was like a gypsy, it was her. She was free and vibrant and she wore cherry red lipstick. She always had cherry red lips, he remembered. Always. He asked her once jokingly where she got them. _"From my mother, silly!" _was her flirtatious answer. He, of course, had asked her what else she got from her mother but she mock-slapped him and he chuckled to himself.

He had wanted to go to the Rising Sun since he got back from Europe, but he thought twice. He had no problem finding women after the war. They wanted a hero. They wanted a gentleman. They wanted _him_. He never spoke of the war, though some asked about it. He didn't want to think about that boy in Holland – the SS boy, as Dick ruefully thought of him as. _Please_. He saw his bright eyes staring into his own orbs. _Don't shoot_.

Dick walked through Pennsylvania Station in his suit. The garment had been custom made, fitted at a shop highly recommended by Lewis. He had a hat and he carried a leather suitcase. Dick looked like a city man – but then again, he wasn't… but then again, who was? Nobody came to New York a city man. Perhaps it was the war which made him that way. He had never been the same again.

As he walked from the station into the hustle and bustle of downtown Manhattan, he thought of the quiet country house that he had always wanted. It was the choice he had made – the promise he had made to himself after the Day of Days. He could never build a house here after everything that had transpired. It would never work. But then again, he thought to himself, he couldn't build a house anywhere. He had nobody to build it with. _A house without love isn't a house at all_, his grandmother used to tell him.

Was he bitter? It depended on how one defined bitter. If bitter was the result of seeing your friends die, dreams destroyed, and wondering how the hell it could all be right after so much had changed… then he was bitter. But he still smiled, though his smiles were rare than they had been before the war.

He wondered how he would define his loneliness. His family had clamored around him, providing him with comfort and support. They never asked him about the war, knowing that the memories were all too real. When he shivered on a really cold winter night and looked blank, nobody asked him why. He knew why. It was a dreadful secret.

He stood at the front of the taxi line, waiting for a yellow cab. He wondered if the war ever even mattered to New York, or if anything ever mattered to New York in the first place. The bright lights and skyscrapers were the pyramids, the cathedrals and the stone temples. The loud civilization that beat down doors and filled dance halls was astounding. Everything was bigger than everything else. New York City was bigger than God.

Dick knew God once. _I should have named you Enoch, Richard. Your grandfather told you about Enoch, my son? _His mother's voice was soft and caring. In 1947, these memories played through Dick's head. He could never have lived up to Enoch – the man of Biblical times who so dutifully walked with God. Enoch died in Bastogne. Enoch died when he couldn't run to save his men when they were being sent on a suicide mission to Foy. Enoch died when he needed Ronald Speirs to complete a task that he could not finish. Enoch died in the river that separated Hagenau from darkness, the grenade fire that melted the face of a man who was still a boy, the death pits of Landsberg, the dimly lit Metro ride in Paris, and the long and daunting journey home.

A yellow cab pulled up and Dick opened the door, placing his suitcase in the backseat. He sat down and looked at the driver.

"The Rising Sun, on the Upper West Side. I want to be let out a few blocks before it, though." His voice was strong – so strong, in fact, that the taxi driver did not question his desire.

The ride did not take very long, with the taxi driver weaving artfully in and out of the traffic, never getting held up for more than a few seconds. The ride went on in silence. Looking through is rear-view mirror, the driver caught a glimpse of his passenger. His face looked like it had been chiseled by a pantheon of gods, and ode to the glory of creation. He sat upright with a posture that was dignified, yet not forced. He fought in the war, the taxi driver concluded. He fought in the war.

The taxi pulled up on the side of the road. Dick paid the taxi driver quickly, grabbed his hat and suitcase, and left the car. He closed the door and then stepped out onto the cold cement of the sidewalk. The sidewalk was abuzz with people – it was alive. He fancied that the city itself was a living, breathing being with roads and sidewalks as veins – and people as the blood vessels.

The thought of seeing Faye in the near future terrified him. He had dreamt of her, he had longed for her. He wanted her. When the young ladies in Pennsylvania saw him come home from the war, he became popular unlike he had been before he originally left. They all wanted him – they told him they needed him – they went out of their way to show off to him. They wore shorter dresses and higher heels and brighter make up. They curled their hair more and even painted their nails, trying to gain his attention. Nobody quite wore cherry red lipstick the way Faye did, however. Nobody could compare.

He remembered the fateful conversation he had with Faye when she had told him that she was going back to New York – right before the invasion of France. He had also remembered the forceful way in which he thrust himself into her the night after she told him the news. He thought of the way she purred wildly as he worked his way more and more deeply into her. And he remembered the way he came inside of her, feeling no remorse, no pain, no want, no pain, no sadness… and he had truly believed he would never see her again.

As he lit a cigarette and continued to walk up the street, he thought of what exactly he wanted. He wanted to _know _her, to be _inside _her. He might have cared before the war – maybe – he might have – if she had been with other men. But he had been with other women since he had returned. He had known the feeling of loneliness – lying next to a hollow body, losing oneself in satin sheets and the faint aroma of lilies and lavender. He had seen the heaving chest of a woman beneath him, taking in his every inch as he thrust himself thoughtlessly into her fragile body, only wanting one thing – Faye. He had cried out for her, silently, at those moments, desperately hoping that she would rescue him from mediocrity.

There had been one woman, months ago, by the name of Cheryl. After he woke up in the hotel room bed, he saw her applying makeup studiously in the bathroom. He saw as she methodically applied cherry red lipstick. The shade was correct, but he did not see the lips he had longed for. He was turned off and he tuned out, hastily dressing himself and leaving a fifty dollar bill on the nightstand.

"_What the hell is your problem? I'm not a whore!" She shouted, her lips moving in an animated fashion – accented by the shade of lipstick which he felt she had no right to wear._

"_Get yourself a ride home… I just…" He couldn't finish… he didn't care. He didn't care if she was Cheryl or Anne or Vivienne or Sandra. He didn't give a damn._

"_You're a real jerk, you know that?" She said, shocked at the thought of not being able to fully satisfy a man. _

_Dick had no answers, so he finished dressing himself. He silently gathered his belongings and left the room._

Almost bumping into a businessman who was walking against the grain of foot traffic, Dick was pulled out of his thoughts. He cut his way through the pedestrian foot traffic with a distinct sense of purpose: he would not and he could not be stopped. The sun was fading into the autumn hues of Central Park, creating an array of orange, pink, and red colors that he had never seen with such intensity. The four blocks leading up to the Rising Sun were walked resolutely; he had requested the taxi driver let him out early just so he could feel such a sense of purpose. This walk had been a long time coming.

The sharp angles of his finely tailored suit flowed with his masculine body as he made his way over the pavement. A chilly breeze circled around the brim of his fedora hat; he felt as if the wind was daring to act against him. Dick Winters had been a man walking all of his life. He had always passed by one obstacle in the road only to espy one other – and of course, this became an endless cycle. As he had grown taller, his stride increased. An onlooker observing may easily have thought that his stride closed the distance between the gaps in the universe. Time disappeared in the space between his ever-moving feet.

xx.

Faye Murdoch stood on the side of the street talking to one of her neighbors while smoking a cigarette. She held the thin stick delicately between her manicured fingers.

"He looks sharp," the middle aged man said with a toothy smile, nodding in the direction of the man who was just about to enter Faye's bar.

Faye turned to look at the man. As she did, she gasped. It had been so long – but she remembered the figure she had just witnessed. The man she had hidden in a room within her soul was no longer merely sitting at a table in the kitchen of her ranch house. They weren't on a dreamy prairie and there was no sweet tea. He was here, he was real, and it was finally time.

xx.

Dick scanned the bar. The last time he had been in the Rising Sun, he had been a theist. He had been a teetotaler. He had been a believer in the goodness of the men around him. Years later, however, he had seen men devolve into a vulture-like state, holding nothing sacred save for themselves. He had learned the language of silence, the peace of mortar bombardment, and the meaning of a single second. Life was different now.

As he looked over the bar, he noticed new paint in place of the antique, nearly-peeling paper that once adorned the walls. He admired the fresh oak top of the bar. It looked immaculate, as if it had only been installed a day prior. Things looked bright and young – as if Faye had been there.

But she wasn't there – he had scanned the space of the bar nearly three times by now. The bartender – standing where she should have been standing, he noted – was a man of no more than thirty years old. Patrons were scattered across the bar, absorbed in a wide array of conversations.

Maybe, he reasoned, he had waited too long. Maybe she had sold the bar and faded into the bustling mass that was New York City. If he couldn't find her at the Rising Sun, he was unsure of how he would proceed next – he could ask the current bartender if he knew anything about the mysterious Faye Murdoch – but there had been all of that… what was the word…_ time_. Time had passed and if she had wanted to see him again, she surely would have looked him up. Hell, she could have looked Lew up – she knew about Nixon, New Jersey.

Unsure of what to do, Dick stepped outside of the bar and too in the street scene around him. He pulled out a Lucky Strike and struck a match quickly – the spark had barely been visible to any passerby that might have tried to steal a glance.

Faye Murdoch stood on the street corner gazing at the man who stood only feet from her. He hadn't seen her – no, she could tell he hadn't – but she knew he was looking for her. She finished her cigarette and smiled to herself, gazing at the handsome man that was so very close to her. He had looked bigger, stronger, and wiser: he looked different. She saw lines ingrained within his face – lines from stress, torment, hunger, and desperate need. She saw that he had a certain cloud of sorrow hanging over him that would never be healed – perhaps, if it could be healed, it would be fixed only by time. She could easily see how the war followed him.

But in his upright posture she saw a man that knew what he wanted. She saw a man with a clarity of purpose that could not be challenged – and hell, if anybody dared to challenge it, she knew they wouldn't last long against such a formidable opponent. He stood tall. He stood upright like a man that had always been told how to stand all of his life – but then one day, broke form, and stood for himself. His broad shoulders were covered by a finely tailored suit that she could easily tell was custom made.

Secretly, she relished the thought that the suit was custom made. No other man, she reasoned, was deserving of the same suit that Richard Winters was wearing. He owned that suit with every fiber of his being. Faye dropped her cigarette to the pavement and put out the dying ember with her foot. Her dark black high hell laid waste to the mixture of nicotine, tobacco, and rolled paper.

This scenario had occurred to her only in her dreams – dreams, of course, that had carried her from the prairie land to a city dominated by steel grey skyscrapers and pure ambition. For so many years – it felt like ages – she had envisioned himself standing on her doorstep in an attempt to find her. She smirked slightly as she saw him look cold and frustrated – she could tell that he had been upset by her absence.

The middle aged man with whom Faye had been speaking to moments prior now stood, leaning against a lamp post. A hand rolled cigarette sat in between his lips. He pulled the stick from his mouth and flashed Dick a grin – it would have been toothy, had he had more teeth.

"You lost?" the man asked, almost irritating Dick. Dick raised an eyebrow in his direction and didn't break from his stone cold facial expression.

"Hardly." Rather, he thought, _I've lost somebody_. He wondered exactly what he would do next – he had never anticipated this, though it was probably the most likely outcome.

Faye Murdoch could no longer hide herself. Had she kept up the ruse, she would have began to tremble, which she would never let Dick see. She needed to see him – to have him recognize her – to end the pain and suffering and loneliness. She needed, desperately, for things to come full circle. With a sense of bitter defiance – if anything – Faye stepped from the street corner and opened her mouth.

"Richard Winters doesn't get lost."

The words rang through Dick's ears with a sense of clarity that he had not heard since he was a child. Her words were pure and unfiltered by the wind or the rustling of the trees that lined the streets. The sound of horns and traffic disappeared, fading into the October afternoon. The world felt different and light. This woman, he realized, had been here all along.

He turned to meet the sweet voice of the speaker. He was met with Faye Murdoch's bright blue eyes looking at him with a sense of eager curiosity. She was smirking – her cherry red lips curled up to the left – and she looked like she possessed great power. She appeared before him as a vision, an owner of a vast tract of land in the city, a controller of those who worked below her, and an entrepreneur who could make things work where none others could. She stood tall, a fall coat wrapped around her curvaceous body.

She was older now, he realized. It was 1947. He had first seen her in 1943, before he had fully become a man. He remembered the days of his youth. After meeting her, things were different. After he got on that troop ship and set sail for Europe, everything changed. And after the Day of Days, nothing would be the same. She hadn't seen him in three years.

It had dawned on the both of them, as they were lost in each other's blue gaze, that eternity could exist within the span of three years. Three whole years: days melting into nights which faded back into days, creating a never ending cycle of loneliness and soul searching. Three years.

Dick broke from looking at Faye to glance at the lamp post where the man had been standing moments prior, but he was gone. He turned back to Faye, smiling with his eyes. She smirked back at him and he could feel deep down what she was thinking.

"Richard." She said clearly in her cool and melodious voice. It had been so long – too long – far too long. There were no words. She walked up to him cautiously, as if to make sure that the ground was solid and that Richard would not disappear before her very eyes.

"Faye." He answered back, completing the song – finishing the verse – and ending the sentence. "I'm…" he tried to explain things. He tried to find the words to start the conversation that was three years overdue. He continued to walk toward Faye as she did the same; in a matter of seconds the distance between them was closed.

"I'm…" he started again, squinting his eyes as he looked directly into her blue orbs, trying to find the words to say to the woman before him.

Faye shook her head and brought a manicured finger up to his lips, pressing softly against him. The touch sent shivers up his spine and caused his lips to break out into a faint smile.

"Don't speak." Faye said softly, removing her finger from his lips. Their eyes continued their waltz, uninterrupted by the city noises and endless bustle that surrounded them People began to walk off of a bus that stopped right in front of the bar, surrounding the pair in a sea of moving bodies and business. They stood still, uninterrupted. "There are no words." Faye instructed Dick, and he nodded in agreement.

It had been three whole years, they understood. The silent language that slipped through their irises communicated as much. Without any sense of caution, Dick brought his lips down to Faye's, capturing them in softness.

Faye wrapped her arms around him and he deepened the kiss. Her body melted into his and she felt a sense of sweet release. For the first time in her life, Faye Murdoch wished that time would freeze and she could capture this moment. She instead stored it in the room within her soul, never wanting to forget the memory.

"I'm sorry," he purred as he broke the kiss. She nodded her head softly and he pulled her into a tight embrace. "I should have looked for you to find you." He admitted this calmly. Deep down, he had been unsure of how to carry on after the war. He didn't think that after what he had been through he'd be worthy of seeing her again – he felt that she would end up seeing right through him. He was afraid of being so vulnerable.

"Richard." Faye once again pressed her finger to his lips, silently telling him to let it go. "You found me." She added these words softly, almost as if they were honey being dripped into an already-comforting cup of tea. "There's no more regret." She kissed his him, quickly nipping his bottom lip. He had longed for her to do that – he had waited for three years. "There's no more 'I'm sorry'." She kissed him once again, nipping him with more intensity. "There's no more past." She pulled away from him and looked into his eyes. "There's just a future." She nipped at his bottom lip once again and he moaned – right there, in the middle of the sidewalk, on a busy afternoon in Manhattan.

"I'm just afraid that you'll disappear," Dick said honestly, looking deeply into her eyes. "It's part of what stopped me from coming here in the first place." He didn't want to make her feel guilty – he had no intention of doing that. He just wanted her to know, albeit subtly, that he needed to be with her.

Faye chuckled gaily; her laughter blew through the zephyrs that danced around the pair. The leaves that had recently turned orange and red were brought to the ground by the faint wind that meandered through the city. It was now the apex of autumn; a cool chill brushed past Faye's ears, bouncing off of her pearl earrings. The city was alive – more so than ever – and Richard felt as if he was, for the first time, a part of it.

Earlier, he had likened New York City to a human body, with street veins and pedestrian blood cells. For the first time in his entire life, he felt as if he was a part of a larger, living, breathing entity. He felt as if he was a platelet rushing through the aorta of a big living organism – and he felt only the desire to move with the body and to live as a party to something greater than himself. He felt alive – along with millions of other people. The people shuffling around him no longer seemed to smother him; he fed off of their energy and a sense of red warmth rushed to his cheeks.

He was not blushing – he was not a teetotaler waiting for a gin and tonic in Swindon – he was a man who, it seemed, had just run a marathon to reach the end of the world. The redness in his cheeks was amplified by a wide smile. For the first time in many years, Faye saw his teeth.

Richard Winters was alive. Faye smiled back at him; the energy that he exuded quickly rubbed off on her. She immediately took his hand and looked up with him.

"I have no intentions of disappearing." She said joyfully. "Unless…" Richard looked at Faye with a raised eyebrow. "I disappear with you." He smiled at her admission, satisfied.

"That was my sincerest hope." He squeezed her hand as they began to walk in the direction of Central Park.

The leaves continued to fall onto the pavement of the sidewalks. A few bright yellow streetcars flew by, carrying passengers on their way to unknown destinations. Men walked their dogs or went about their workdays; children tried their very hardest to sell as many newspapers as possible. Two old Italian man sat at on a stoop playing chess – Faye instantly remembered that they always seemed to be in the middle of a dead-locked match – and a group of three women rushed by, chatting with each other about their plans for the evening. The sounds of the city were vibrant and penetrating; they blew through every corner and zoomed in and out of the weaving traffic. Yet, in all of this, there was peace.

There was solitude and a sense of completeness. For the first time in their lives, Richard Winters and Faye Murdoch felt as if they were whole. She held onto his hand tightly, eager to never let go, as they made their way to Central Park.

That afternoon was one they would spend largely in silence, admiring the evolving foliage that existed within the heart of the city. Everything had a purpose, they saw. Everything was always changing and growing into something new. Everything was there for a reason. As they watched the sun set completely into the mixture of trees and skyscrapers, they realized that they, for the first time, would be able to start again. There would be no regret, no pain, and no sorrow.

Richard rose first from the park bench. Faye stood up after him and they kissed passionately as the sun was finally sinking into the trees for good. Richard pulled away from Faye, but took her hand as he did so. With their fingers intertwined, they began to walk down one of the paths leading to the Upper West Side.

"Come on, Richard." Faye murmured in a barely audible voice as they walked hand in hand through the park. "It's time for us to go home." Richard smiled and obliged.

"Yes," He squeezed her hand once more – it was a silent comfort that let him know she was really there – and turned to her. "I believe it is."

x.x.x.x.x.x.x

**THERE WILL BE AN EPILOGUE, FOLKS! DON'T FORGET TO REVIEW!**


	13. EPILOGUE

**Author's Note**: This will be the _last_ chapter in 'Up With a Twist'. Thank you all for sticking with this story until the bitter end. I appreciate any reviews – it takes little to no time and it means a lot to get the criticism, praise, and general commentary.

Without further ado... enjoy...

**EPILOGUE**

The sleek red motorcar cut through the arid desert land of Arizona, leaving only dust in its path. The road extended for miles into the dark orange sun that was beginning to kiss the barren land. Dick's skin was darker, evidence of a long trip through the American heartland in the middle of August. His eyes hid behind a smart looking pair of dark sunglasses, which only served to accentuate the strength of his facial features, further obscuring any perceived emotion. A well worn oxford shirt hung over his muscular body, with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows exposing well built and tanned arms. He drove with a sense of authority, one hand casually on the wheel while the other hovered over the stick shift with a casual nonchalance.

Faye sat in the passenger seat wearing a bright floral dress, which clung to her fuller body. Her dark hair was pulled back with a silk handkerchief; her eyes, too, were covered by smart looking sunglasses. A Lucky Strike sat in her right hand; only her tight yet feminine grip and the protection of the windshield kept the burning cigarette from flying out of the red convertible.

Dick looked to the woman sitting next to him and smirked. It was a mixture of lust, passion, and the will to drive faster than his car could take. The car continued to slice through the desert in a fluid motion. The land on either side of the road was flat – flatter, Faye remarked, than Oklahoma. Flatter than a town leveled by a Panzer division, Dick mused. No matter what he did, it always fell back to that. Always.

Faye's cherry red lips turned upwards into a smile as she saw the sign that she had so desperately been watching for. "SAN BERNANDINO COUNTY LINE– 20 MILES"was written in white, faded by long years of neglect and abuse by the wind and sun.

"California." Dick said aloud, as the car sped past the sign. A foolish endeavor, perhaps – moving on a whim to an area one had never been to before. Foolish, perhaps – but only to those who had something to lose. Dick drove faster as he grew more excited with anticipation.

The cash from the sale of the Rising Sun, Faye's mom's ranch, savings bonds, and Dick's military pay sat in a large suitcase in the back seat of the convertible, under lock and key. Dick's gun was in the glove compartment along with ammunition. A foolish journey, many would say, traversing uninhabited parts of the heartland and staying in random motels along the way. Foolish, of course, if you had never seen what it means to live or die. Foolish, most obviously, if you never felt the thrill and the horror of falling out of the sky over men who wanted nothing more than to kill you in cold blood.

The western wind blew through Dick's hair as he smirked, thinking about the cash and the gun that he had stored in his red car. Thinking about his red car, above all, made him smirk devilishly. Red... cherry red, specifically. Cherry red and fast. Cherry red and rather powerful. Cherry red, indeed.

xxxxxxxxxx

"It's different." Faye said aloud as she stood in the living room of their house. The home sat on top of a cliff that overlooked the Pacific Ocean. Faye had seen pictures of the great body of water – but she had never imagined that she would see it with her own eyes. The smell of the fresh salt water was carried up the craggy rocks by a forceful sea breeze. It was that time of year – the one where you could feel the very seasons rebelling against each other, fighting each other, daring to be part of the great, drastic change that had always been part of life...

"Bad different?" Dick questioned with a raised eyebrow, causing Faye to giggle.

"Good different." Faye said as she dropped her suitcases on the hardwood floors. "Definitely good different."

"And here I was worried that I had driven thousands of miles only to disappoint you..."

"Dick, you never disappoint me." Faye said as she walked around the house. "Just don't let it go to your head." Dick chuckled.

Thousands of miles: the words which resonated within the apartment – echoing off the walls. Dick and Faye looked at each other and knew, instantly, the magnitude of the words which he had spoken. The journey had been a long one; a building full of unlikely corridors and hidden doors, all leading to something entirely unexpected. The bitter taste of cold salty ocean air and the smog of the city lingered in Faye's psyche, reminding her of the long ship ride back to New York from England. It had been a very long time coming.

"Does it feel like home?" Dick inquired, looking over the large space. A large bay window cut through the room, allowing the pair to look directly into the setting sun; Faye could see it sinking down into the Pacific Ocean. Faye struggled to define what she felt. It was a mixture of love and peace that she had never known before – an odd mixture that she had always wanted. She remembered yearning for it at a very young age; she used to dream of this feeling – but she could never imagine exactly what it would be like.

Faye turned to Dick and smiled.

"Home is with you." She sighed, unable to find any other words to define what was going through her mind. Faye walked to the front door and closed it tight. "I'm planning on staying a while," she said with a smile. Dick laughed lightly. "It's time to stop running."

The distance between the two closed as Dick pulled Faye into a long embrace. The warmth of his body made her yearn for rest. She had been tired. It had been a _long_time. Faye sighed.

"It's time to stop running," Dick whispered into her ear in a husky voice. Faye felt herself go weak in the knees. She had dreamed of this and wanted it for so long. "You're home now." He added, causing her to practically fall into him.

"You're home now." He added once more, running his fingers through Faye's hair and embracing you. "No more running."

xxxxxxxxxxxx

_THE END_

_**A/N**_: FYI – Reviews are the only way we writers on get paid!


End file.
